Plants use many means to attract pollinators, including visual cues and odor. We investigated how nonpigment floral chemistry influences nectar removal, floral visitation, florivory, rates of outcrossing, and fitness through both male and female functions. We blocked expression of biosynthetic genes of the dominant floral attractant [benzyl acetone (Nachal1)] and nectar repellent [nicotine (Nap...

A pollination syndrome is defined as a suite of floral traits that are associated with the attraction of a specific group of animals as pollinators. Traits such as flower morphology, color, scent, and rewards contribute to the plant's reproductive success by attracting pollinators. Here we focus on the genetics of natural variation in flower morphology and how the adaptation between plants and ...

We studied the pollination biology of Canna paniculata (Cannaceae), a plant species common in the Atlantic Rainforest of southeastern Brazil. The species presents specialized ornithophilous flowers, which in our study area are solely pollinated by the hermit hummingbird Phaethornis eurynome. Although C. paniculata is capable of bearing fruit after self-pollination, it requires pollinators for r...

Dafni, A. 1983. Pollination of Orchis caspia – a nectarless plant which deceives the pollinators of nectariferous species from other plant families. Journal of Ecology 71: 467-474. In this study of the title species, Dafni contributes to basic knowledge about the nature of deceptive pollination systems and introduces the ideas of pollinators finding it hard to distinguish between a mimic and a ...

Most plants depend on insects for pollination. Honey bees pollinate many of the foods people eat, but did you know that wild plants, and animals like birds bears, also pollinators? Native are most diverse efficient pollinators. Thousands bee species transport pollen between in deserts, forests, mountains, meadows, other habitats. This service helps reproduce successfully, provide food shelter a...

Ecological restoration of plant-pollinator interactions has received surprisingly little attention, despite animal-mediated pollination underpinning reproduction of the majority of higher plants. Here, we offer a conceptual and practical framework for the ecological restoration of pollination mutualisms. Through the use of targeted restoration plantings to attract and sustain pollinators and in...

The intimate mutualism between fig wasps and figs has long captivated biologists, and new phylogenies are now uncovering its evolutionary history. Fig-pollinating wasps evolved just once, but fig parasitism has evolved repeatedly and convergently. Figs and their pollinators appear to have co-speciated considerably, but not invariably, because the famous one-to-one rule of specificity is often b...