Bumblebees (Bombus spp.) and honeybees, Apis mellifera, both use odour cues deposited on flowers by previous visitors to improve their foraging efficiency. Short-lived repellent scents are used to avoid probing flowers that have recently been depleted of nectar and/or pollen, and longer-term attractant scents to indicate particularly rewarding flowers. Previous research has indicated that bumbl...

Ornamental horticulture is a very important economic aspect of horticulture and plays a fundamental part in the way humans interact with and modify the environment. Floriculture is in turn a dominant sector of ornamental horticulture. Now, thousands of varieties of cut-flowers, pot plants, hanging plants, bedding plants, shrubs, lawn and turf, ornamental tree and aquatic plants are available to...

Many co-sexual plants segregate female and male function among flowers on an inflorescence through dichogamy or the production of unisexual flowers. Sexual segregation may reduce self-pollination among flowers within inflorescences (geitonogamy), thereby increasing the pollen available for export to other plants. To assess these complementary roles we manipulated the simultaneously hermaphrodit...

In this Quick Guide, Johnson introduces the reader to carrion flowers, which evolved to mimic rotting flesh. This adaptation attracts insects that facilitate pollination.

The Caricaceae is a small family of tropical trees and herbs in which most species are dioecious. In the present study, we extend our previous work on dioecy in the Caricaceae, characterising the morphological variation in sexual expression in flowers of the dioecious tree Jacaratia mexicana. We found that, in J. mexicana, female plants produce only pistillate flowers, while male plants are sex...

Many insects which gather nectar or pollen exhibit flower constancy, a learned fidelity to a particular species of plant. Recent studies suggest that foraging insects may use a perceptual mechanism akin to a search image to detect flowers, in a manner analogous to the way that predators search for prey. This has emerged as an alternative (but not mutually exclusive) explanation for flower const...

Floral color changes and retention of old flowers are frequently combined phenomena restricted to the floral guide or single flowers in few-flowered inflorescences. They are thought to increase the attractiveness over long distances and to direct nearby pollinators toward the rewarding flowers. In Tibouchina pulchra, a massively flowering tree, the whole flower changes its color during anthesis...