Question

Some moth species have a very short window of time for mating each year. One year the moths were breeding during a week when it was breezy and their reproductive success was very low. What is the likely cause of this low success rate?

		Male moths could not follow the pheromone trails of the females because the wind dispersed the chemicals
		Female moths could not produce pheromones due to low water availability
		Female moths did not produce many eggs due to lower water availability
		Male moths grew at a slower rate and were not ready to mate when females were

Why might workers within a population of haplodiploid eusocial insects have evolved the "willingness" to help the queen raise more offspring (i.e., sisters of the workers) rather than reproducing themselves? Assume the same male is fertilizing the queen.

		Workers are more closely related to sisters than they would be to their own daughters, and hence raise their inclusive fitness by helping raise the queen's offspring
		Workers are incapable of reproduction and therefore are making the best of a bad situation by helping raise their sisters
		The workers help to raise the queen's offspring because there is a good chance that she will return the favor when they become queens
		Workers are genetically identical to each other and therefore work to pass on their collective gene pool

Answer 1

1. The moths couldnt get a high reproductive success rate as the environmental conditions were not favourable and hence the male and female species of the moth couldnt mate. The main reason for this is that the female moth releases the pheromones and the male moth detects them and fly towards that direction to mate. But due to the heavy breeze, the pheromones smell couldnt get detected easily and hence the low reproductive success. Hence the answer to this question is option: Male moths could not follow the pheromone trails of the females because the wind dispersed the chemicals.

2. The workers are sterile and all of them share the same genetic pool as if there genes were identical copies to each other. Due to this similarity among the workers passed on from their ancestors, they have evolved the willingness to help the queen raise more offsprings. Hence the answer to this question is option: Workers are genetically identical to each other and therefore work to pass on their collective gene pool.

If you have any query kindly comment before giving thumbs up. Thank you.