We found that even newly emerged individuals have a hydrocarbon pattern characteristic of their nest origin. The statistical analyses applied to the chemical compounds separated the individuals according to their colonies. However, guards were not able to discriminate between newly emerged nestmates and nonnestmates. Newly emerged workers have a very simple hydrocarbon pattern on their cuticle consisting almost entirely of linear alkanes; the alkenes and methylalkanes found on young and older workers were essentially absent. There is some evidence that linear alkanes are not involved in recognition processes. Dani et al. (2001) found that recognition in the paper wasp Polistes dominulus depends only upon alkenes and methylalkanes; linear alkanes take no part in this species’ recognition process. Dani et al. (2005) similarly showed that
alkanes have no effect on recognition in the honeybee, inwhich only alkanes and alkenes are found. Breed et al. (2004) found that newly emerged honeybees also present a less diverse mixture of cuticular compounds than do older individuals, and when newly emerged
honeybees are introduced into a foreign colony, they are not rejected. The authors attributed this finding to a lack of recognition cues in these bees. It is possible that the simple pattern of linear alkanes found here gives no clue to recognition.