Floral constancy in bees: a revision of theories and a comparison with other pollinators

Amaya–Márquez, Marisol

doi:10.25100/socolen.v35i2.9221

Cited by 43 publications

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“…Pollinators are also known to vary in the quality of pollen they deliver (Herrera, 1987 ), but pollinator effectiveness with respect to HP deposition is less studied. Furthermore, fidelity to a given plant species within a foraging bout (floral constancy; Waser, 1986 ) is not necessarily widespread among pollinator taxa (Gross, 1992 ; Amaya‐Márquez, 2009 ). Consequently, pollinators should also vary in the amount of HP and/or the proportion of HP relative to CP they transfer.…”

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confidence: 99%

Causes and consequences of variation in heterospecific pollen receipt in Oenothera fruticosa

Smith

Swartz

Spigler

2021

American J of Botany

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Premise: Heterospecific pollen transfer, the transfer of pollen between species, is common among co-flowering plants, yet the amount of pollen received is extremely variable among species. Intraspecific variation in heterospecific pollen receipt can be even greater, but we lack an understanding of its causes and fitness consequences in wild populations. Methods: We examined potential drivers of variation in heterospecific pollen receipt in Oenothera fruticosa. We evaluated the relationship between heterospecific and conspecific pollen receipt and considered how visitation by different pollinator groups, local floral neighborhood composition, and flowering phenology affect the total amount and proportion of heterospecific pollen received. Finally, we tested whether variation in heterospecific pollen receipt translated into lower seed production. Results: Heterospecific pollen was ubiquitous on O. fruticosa stigmas, but the amount received was highly variable and unrelated to conspecific pollen receipt. Heterospecific pollen receipt depended on pollinator type, the proportion of nearby conspecific flowers, and flowering date. Significant interactions revealed that the effects of pollinator type and neighborhood were not independent, further contributing to variation in heterospecific pollen. Naturally occurring levels of heterospecific pollen were sufficient to negatively impact seed set, but large amounts of conspecific pollen counteracted this detrimental effect. Conclusions: Although selection could act on floral traits that attract quality pollinators and promote synchronous flowering in O. fruticosa, the risk of heterospecific pollen is equally dependent on local floral context. This work highlights how extrinsic and intrinsic factors contribute to intraspecific variation in heterospecific pollen receipt in wild plants, with significant fitness consequences. K E Y W O R D Sco-flowering, floral neighborhood, flowering phenology, interspecific pollen transfer, intraspecific variation, Onagraceae, pollen load, pollination, pollinator effectiveness, seed set Over 80% of angiosperms rely on animal pollinators for successful pollination (Ollerton et al., 2011). Yet because most plants share pollinators with several to a few dozen other co-flowering species (Jordano, 1987;Waser et al., 1996), this success can be compromised by pollinator-mediated competition among plant species (Brown et al., 2002;Lopezaraiza-Mikel et al., 2007). Plants can compete directly for visitation by shared pollinators (Waser, 1978) or indirectly when shared pollinators transfer pollen between plant species, termed heterospecific pollen transfer (HPT; Morales and Traveset, 2008). Heterospecific pollen transfer is extremely common in co-flowering communities, and its incidence and intensity vary markedly across species (McLernon et al., 1996;Fang and Huang, 2013;Tur et al., 2016), with implications for the evolution of floral morphology, species divergence, and community structure (Moreira-Hernández and Muchhala, 2019). Even as our understandi...

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confidence: 99%

Causes and consequences of variation in heterospecific pollen receipt in Oenothera fruticosa

Smith

Swartz

Spigler

2021

American J of Botany

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“…These results make intuitive sense as a common morph, that also is preferred, has a high probability of pollination success (Figure S2), with little additional fitness gains to be had from constancy. It is worth noting that additional factors beyond preference and constancy, such as competition among pollinators and learning, can influence pollinator foraging patterns (reviewed in Amaya‐Márquez, 2009; Goulson & Wright, 1998). Nevertheless, these would likely lead to similar effects as observed here, amplifying the fitness differences across morphs when any preference is present.…”

Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…If pollinators preferred paler or darker flowers, we would choose values closer to 0 or 1, respectively. It is worth noting that additional factors beyond preference and constancy, such as competition among pollinators and learning, can influence pollinator foraging patterns (reviewed in Amaya‐Márquez, 2009). Nevertheless, these would likely lead to similar effects as observed here, amplifying the fitness differences across morphs when any preference is present.…”

Section: Methodsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…In modelling fitness effects due to interactions with pollinators, we include colour preference, constancy and pollen carryover, building on the prior work of Montgomery (2009) in the context of pollinator competition. Although constancy (the tendency of an individual pollinator to specialize on a particular flowering species or morph while foraging) is typically associated with bees (Niovi Jones & Reithel, 2001; Waser, 1986), this type of nonrandom foraging is common in a range of pollinator species, including beetles, flies and hummingbirds (Amaya‐Márquez, 2009; Goulson & Wright, 1998), and thus, is important to include in a general model. Finally, our framework assumes that pigment production is correlated across plant tissues, a pattern observed across many groups of flowering plants (Bate‐Smith & Swain, 1962; Del Valle et al, 2019; Warren & Mackenzie, 2001) that is related to the shared biochemical pathway and regulatory architecture (Albert et al, 2014).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Modelling pollinator and nonpollinator selection on flower colour variation

2022

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Flower colour variation is ubiquitous within and between populations, which is why it has long been a focal point for studies of natural selection. This body of work has uncovered a wide range of selective agents, including pollinators, herbivores and various abiotic factors. Nevertheless, we lack an integrative framework for predicting the phenotypic outcome in terms of floral pigmentation when these forces act collectively and often in opposition. We here present such a framework through a model that incorporates selection on pigmentation at the vegetative phase (i.e. through survival to reproduction) and at the flowering phase (i.e. on pollinator attraction). We focus on anthocyanins as common class of pigments although the model is equally applicable to any compounds that can be jointly expressed in vegetative tissue and in flowers. We explore the dynamics of our model in a theoretical context and in four scenarios based on classic systems for studying selection on flower colour. Our model predicts that pollinators are the main driver for flower colour evolution, but selection on seedling survival plays a major role in the absence of pollen limitation, that is, if pollinator abundance is sufficiently high, or if pollinator preference is absent or weak (high variance in colour preference). In each of the case studies, our model recovered the predicted patterns of fitness for each floral morph given the strength and nature of selection. This work suggests that selection at the vegetative phase must act alone or be exceptionally strong to negate pollinator preference for particular colours. Nevertheless, the influence of differential survival associated with anthocyanin production leaves a clear signature on the fitness curves, suggesting that nonpollinator agents of selection can often be detected from empirical data. Synthesis: Overall, the application of this model to empirical systems will be key for understanding how flower colour diversity evolves and for predicting how changes in climate and pollinator communities may jointly alter evolutionary trajectories.

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“…For example, a pollinator may be highly specialised during a single foraging bout, which is often called “floral constancy” or “flower constancy”, but it may have a substantially broader diet over its lifetime ( Heinrich, 1976 ; Brosi, 2016 ). Flower constancy has been demonstrated in many pollinators, including social and solitary bees, butterflies, and hoverflies ( Heinrich, 1976 ; Waser, 1986 ; Lewis, 1986 ; Goulson & Wright, 1998 ; Slaa, Cevaal & Sommeijer, 1998 ; Amaya-Márquez, 2009 ). However, it only considers foraging decisions over a very short temporal scale, often only several consecutive flower visits.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Individual-level specialisation and interspecific resource partitioning in bees revealed by pollen DNA metabarcoding

Klečka

Mikát

Koloušková

et al. 2022

PeerJ

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It is increasingly recognised that intraspecific variation in traits, such as morphology, behaviour, or diet is both ubiquitous and ecologically important. While many species of predators and herbivores are known to display high levels of between-individual diet variation, there is a lack of studies on pollinators. It is important to fill in this gap because individual-level specialisation of flower-visiting insects is expected to affect their efficiency as pollinators with consequences for plant reproduction. Accordingly, the aim of our study was to quantify the level of individual-level specialisation and foraging preferences, as well as interspecific resource partitioning, in three co-occurring species of bees of the genus Ceratina (Hymenoptera: Apidae: Xylocopinae), C. chalybea, C. nigrolabiata, and C. cucurbitina. We conducted a field experiment where we provided artificial nesting opportunities for the bees and combined a short-term mark-recapture study with the dissection of the bees’ nests to obtain repeated samples from individual foraging females and complete pollen provisions from their nests. We used DNA metabarcoding based on the ITS2 locus to identify the composition of the pollen samples. We found that the composition of pollen carried on the bodies of female bees and stored in the brood provisions in their nests significantly differed among the three co-occurring species. At the intraspecific level, individual females consistently differed in their level of specialisation and in the composition of pollen carried on their bodies and stored in their nests. We also demonstrate that higher generalisation at the species level stemmed from larger among-individual variation in diets, as observed in other types of consumers, such as predators. Our study thus reveals how specialisation and foraging preferences of bees change from the scale of individual foraging bouts to complete pollen provisions accumulated in their nests over many days. Such a multi-scale view of foraging behaviour is necessary to improve our understanding of the functioning of plant-flower visitor communities.

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Floral constancy in bees: a revision of theories and a comparison with other pollinators

Cited by 43 publications

References 0 publications

Causes and consequences of variation in heterospecific pollen receipt in Oenothera fruticosa

Causes and consequences of variation in heterospecific pollen receipt in Oenothera fruticosa

Modelling pollinator and nonpollinator selection on flower colour variation

Individual-level specialisation and interspecific resource partitioning in bees revealed by pollen DNA metabarcoding

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