Thirty-five percent of global production from crops including at least 800 cultivated plants depend on animal pollination. The transformation of agriculture in the past half-century has triggered a decline in bees and other insect pollinators. In North America, losses of bee colonies have accelerated since 2004, leaving the continent with fewer managed pollinators than at any time in the past 5...

782 American Journal of Botany 97(5): 782–796, 2010; http://www.amjbot.org/ © 2010 Botanical Society of America Understanding how reproductive traits evolved in the past leads to important insights into how organisms adapted. In sexually reproducing organisms, traits associated with outcrossing are thought to be under strong selection because of their direct effect on reproductive success; the ...

†Background and Aims The underlying evolutionary processes of pollinator-driven floral diversification are still poorly understood. According to the Grant–Stebbins model speciation begins with adaptive local differentiation in the response to spatial heterogeneity in pollinators. Although this crucial process links the microand macroevolution of floral adaptation, it has received little attenti...

Figs are the inflorescences of fig trees (Ficus spp., Moraceae). They are shaped like a hollow ball, lined on their inner surface by numerous tiny female flowers. Pollination is carried out by host-specific fig wasps (Agaonidae). Female pollinators enter the figs through a narrow entrance gate and once inside can walk around on a platform generated by the stigmas of the flowers. They lay their ...