Data from: Individual learning performance and exploratory activity are linked to colony foraging success in a mass-recruiting ant

Learning plays an important role in the life of many animals. In social insects, colony foraging success depends on the combined actions of many individuals and learning contributes to individual foraging success. In many ants, for example, route learning helps foragers to navigate between the nest and a food source. Here, we studied if the foraging success of a colony depends on the route-learning performance of its individuals. We used a doubly bifurcating T-maze to assess the route-learning performance of ants from 12 Lasius niger colonies. We also measured the propensity of workers to deposit trail pheromone and to explore the surrounding of their nest. We then tested colony foraging performance in a complex maze, set up either as a poor environment (one food source at the end of one tip), or a rich environment (a food source at the end of each tip). We found that individual learning performance was linked to colony foraging success in the rich, but not the poor environment. The propensity of individual ants to lay pheromone correlated negatively with their learning performance and only predicted colony foraging success in colonies with poor learning abilities in a rich environment. The strongest predictor of colony foraging success was exploratory activity, which differed consistently between colonies. Our results suggest that the importance of individual learning for colony foraging success depends on the environment and that explorative activity is an important factor for colony foraging success.

学习在众多动物的生命活动中发挥着重要作用。在社会性昆虫中，蚁群的觅食成功率依赖于众多个体的协同行为，而学习能力对个体觅食成功亦有贡献。例如，在多数蚂蚁类群中，路径学习可帮助觅食者在巢穴与食物源之间完成导航。本研究旨在探究蚁群的觅食成功率是否取决于其个体的路径学习表现。我们采用双分叉T型迷宫，对来自12个黑毛蚁（Lasius niger）蚁群的蚂蚁个体的路径学习能力进行评估。同时，我们还测定了工蚁遗留踪迹信息素的倾向，以及其对巢穴周边环境的探索行为倾向。随后，我们在复杂迷宫中测试蚁群的觅食表现，该迷宫设置为两种环境：贫瘠环境（仅单分支末端设有一处食物源）与富足环境（每一分支末端均设有一处食物源）。研究结果显示，在富足环境中，个体学习表现与蚁群觅食成功率存在关联，但在贫瘠环境中并无此关联。个体蚂蚁遗留信息素的倾向与其学习表现呈负相关，且仅在富足环境中、学习能力较弱的蚁群中，该倾向可预测蚁群的觅食成功率。对蚁群觅食成功率预测性最强的因素为探索活动水平，且不同蚁群的探索活动水平存在稳定差异。本研究结果表明，个体学习对蚁群觅食成功率的重要性取决于所处环境，而探索活动水平是影响蚁群觅食成功率的关键因素。