Flying ants mate close to home, produce inbred offspring

Ant queens stay close to home in their hunt for a mate and as a result produce thousands of inbred offspring, a study has found. A queen mates only once, can live up to 30 years, and will continue re-producing long after her male mate is dead using the original sperm. The one mating flight will therefore determine the fate of a colony for decades to come. Inbred colonies will produce fewer offspring and a queen who is herself inbred will have a much shorter lifespan.

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