Genetic and demographic processes can drive small populations to extinction. Their interaction can generate extinction vortices. In Hymenoptera, males are haploid and females are diploid. In species with single-locus complementary sex determination (sl-CSD), hemizygous at the CSD gene develop in males and heterozygous diploids, in females. Homozygous develop in diploids males, often unviable or sterile. Theoretical studies suggest that the production of diploid males associated with demographic and environmental stochasticity may drive small populations into an extinction vortex.The first objective is to stimulate collaboration between genetics and demography by proposing a definition for component Allee effects generated by genetic processes. Component and demographic genetic Allee effects were detected in the literature.The second objective was to investigate the presence of a genetic, and maybe demographic, Allee effect in populations of the parasitoid Venturia canescens, a Hymenoptera with sl-CSD. Microsatellite markers were developed and used to show a negative relationship between genetic diversity and proportion of diploid males in isolated and bottlenecked populations. Diploid males can mate but they are sterile. Inbreeding depression affecting females is negligible. We created and monitored experimental populations of V. canescens with different levels of genetic diversity. A genetic Allee effect due to the production of diploid males was detected but it did not influence the growth rate or the probability of extinction of populations. Extinction events observed thus seem mainly due to demographic stochasticity.
