BEHAVIOR OF THE SLAVE-MAKING ANT, 
HA RPA GOXENVS A MERIC AN VS (EMERY), 
AND ITS HOST SPECIES UNDER “SEMINATURAL” 
LABORATORY CONDITIONS 
(HYMENOPTERA: FORMICIDAE)' 
By Thomas M. Alloway 
AND 
Maria Guadalupe Del Rio Pesado 
Erindale College 
University of Toronto 
Mississauga, Ontario L5L 1C6 
Canada 
Introduction 
Slave-making ants are social parasites that raid the nests of host- 
species colonies, capture brood, and transport it back to the parasite 
colony. There, host-species workers eclosing from captured brood 
become “slaves” which perform all the usual worker-ant functions in 
the slave-maker colony (see review by Buschinger et ai 1980). 
Harpagoxenus aniericanus (Emery) is an obligatory slave-making 
parasite which forms mixed colonies with workers of three Lepto- 
thorax host species: L. amhiguus Emery, L. curvispinosus Mayr, 
and L. longispinosus Roger. Young H. aniericanus queens found 
colonies by entering host-species nests, killing or driving off the 
adults, and inducing the host-species workers which subsequently 
mature from worker pupae in the nest to rear a brood of slave- 
maker workers (Wesson 1939). These parasite workers then aug- 
ment the slave worker force by raiding other host-species nests. 
Wesson (1939) and Alloway (1979) observed H. aniericanus slave 
raids in the laboratory by placing populous H. aniericanus nests in 
'This research was supported by a grant from the Natural Sciences and Engineering 
Research Council (Canada) to the first author and by a scholarship from CON ACYT 
(Consejo Nacional de Ciencia y Tecnologia, Mexico) to the second author. The 
authors would like to thank Victor Chudin for his assistance in collecting the data 
and Robin Stuart, David Gibo, and James Beckwith for their constructive comments 
on the manuscript. 
Manuscript received hy the editor September 30. 1983. 
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