page_title: Gyne
hierarchical_section_title: Gyne
caption_attribution_description: English: Apis mellifera scutellata Common Name: Africanized honey bee Photographer: Scott Bauer, USDA Agricultural Research Service, United States Descriptor: Feature(s) Description: Closeup of Africanized honey bees (AHBs) surrounding a European queen honey bee (EHB), marked with a pink dot for identification. Since AHBs arrived in Texas in 1990, they've mated with EHBs and spread throughout the Southwest. But rather than commingling, AHBs tend to replace EHBs, partly because EHB queen bees mate disproportionately with African drones. Image taken in: United States Español: Apis mellifera scutellata
context_page_description: The gyne is the primary reproductive female caste of social insects. Gynes are those destined to become queens, whereas female workers are typically sterile and cannot become queens. A colony with multiple queens is said to be a polygyne form, whereas with only one is a monogyne form.
  The fire ant Solenopsis invicta is known to have colonies in both polygyne and monogyne forms.
  The small red ant, Leptothorax acervorum, has colonies that switch from monogyny to polygyny as a result of seasonal fluctuations.
  The little fire ant Wasmannia auropunctata produces unique kinds of meiotic oocytes with a drastic reduction in recombination. These oocytes may either fuse together for gyne production or be fertilized by male gametes for the production of workers.
  In the wasp species Apoica flavissima queens display distinct morphological differences from the sterile worker class. In Ropalidia plebeiana, gynes do not stay in the nest after they emerge as adults, but may spend their winters in their maternal nests.
context_section_description: The gyne is the primary reproductive female caste of social insects (especially ants, wasps, and bees of order Hymenoptera, as well as termites). Gynes are those destined to become queens, whereas female workers are typically sterile and cannot become queens. A colony with multiple queens is said to be a polygyne form, whereas with only one is a monogyne form.
  The fire ant Solenopsis invicta is known to have colonies in both polygyne and monogyne forms.
  The small red ant, Leptothorax acervorum, has colonies that switch from monogyny to polygyny as a result of seasonal fluctuations.
  The little fire ant Wasmannia auropunctata produces unique kinds of meiotic oocytes with a drastic reduction in recombination.  These oocytes may either fuse together for gyne production (automictic parthenogenesis with central fusion) or be fertilized by male gametes for the production of workers.
  In the wasp species Apoica flavissima queens display distinct morphological differences from the sterile worker class. In Ropalidia plebeiana, gynes do not stay in the nest after they emerge as adults, but may spend their winters in their maternal nests.  
  In species lacking morphological castes (i.e., where "workers" may not be sterile), the term "gyne" is usually reserved for those females whose entire life is spent as a reproductive or potential reproductive, as opposed to those who start life as a worker and subsequently attain reproductive status (often called a "replacement queen" or a "laying worker"). These can be seen in certain species of stingless bee like the Plebeia remota where both gynes and workers are capable of reproducing.  In most species with annual colony cycles, only gynes can enter diapause and overwinter, while workers – both non-reproductive and reproductive – die off. In some groups, such as paper wasps, gynes join with other gynes at the time of nest founding, and may be relegated to subordinate reproductive roles, so being a gyne does not guarantee that a female will become a queen.
caption: Queen (marked) and workers of the Africanised honey bee, Apis mellifera scutellata
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