Colony and individual life-history responses to temperature in a social insect pollinator

1. Pollinating insects are of major ecological and commercial importance, yet they may be facing ecological disruption from a changing climate. Despite this threat, few studies have investigated the life-history responses of pollinators to experimentally controlled changes in temperature, which should be especially informative for species with complex life histories such as eusocial insects. 2. This study uses the key pollinator Bombus terrestris, a eusocial bumblebee with an annual colony cycle, to determine how temperature affects life-history traits at both individual and colony levels. 3. In two laboratory experiments, we reared B. terrestris colonies at either 20 or 25 °C, and measured differences in a set of life-history traits including colony longevity, queen longevity, worker longevity, production of workers, production of sexuals (queen and male production) and growth schedule, as well as effects on thermoregulatory behaviours. 4. Higher rearing temperature had a significant p...