Pollinator‐mediated interactions between cultivated papaya and co‐flowering plant species

Abstract

Many modern crop varieties rely on animal pollination to set fruit and seeds. Intensive crop plantations usually do not provide suitable habitats for pollinators so crop yield may depend on the surrounding vegetation to maintain pollination services. However, little is known about the effect of pollinator‐mediated interactions among co‐flowering plants on crop yield or the underlying mechanisms. Plant reproductive success is complex, involving several pre‐ and post‐pollination events; however, the current literature has mainly focused on pre‐pollination events in natural plant communities. We assessed pollinator sharing and the contribution to pollinator diet in a community of wild and cultivated plants that co‐flower with a focal papaya plantation. In addition, we assessed heterospecific pollen transfer to the stigmatic loads of papaya and its effect on fruit and seed production. We found that papaya shared at least one pollinator species with the majority of the co‐flowering plants. Despite this, heterospecific pollen transfer in cultivated papaya was low in open‐pollinated flowers. Hand‐pollination experiments suggest that heterospecific pollen transfer has no negative effect on fruit production or weight, but does reduce seed production. These results suggest that co‐flowering plants offer valuable floral resources to pollinators that are shared with cultivated papaya with little or no cost in terms of heterospecific pollen transfer. Although HP reduced seed production, a reduced number of seeds per se are not negative, given that from an agronomic perspective the number of seeds does not affect the monetary value of the papaya fruit.

Visitantes florales en el cultivo de Phaseolus coccineus (Fabaceae) en el Altiplano de Puebla, México: importancia del manejo agrícola y color de flor

“…It was also greater than that observed in cultivars of Mexico, since it exceeded that reported by Burquez and Sarukhán (1980) in the state of Morelos (five species reported, including hummingbirds for the first time) and by Sousa-Peña (1992) in Chihuahua, where 16 species of visitors were found, including hummingbirds. The greater number of floral visitors found in our studies could be attributed to the combination of flowers present in the fields, as well as to the diversity of co-flowering species around the fields (Badillo-Montaño et al, 2018). It could also partly be due to the fact that the study was developed in a locality belonging to a region (the states of Puebla, Oaxaca and Chiapas) in which a high diversity of wild and domesticated forms of P. coccineus is concentrated (Delgado Salinas, 1988).…”

Mutualistic and antagonistic interactions differ in wild and domesticated papaya (Carica papaya) in its centre of origin

“…For domesticated papaya, Badillo‐Montaño et al . (2019) studied whether three varieties of papaya (Maradol, Msxj and BS‐2) shared pollinators with the co‐flowering plants in an experimental plantation in Muna, Yucatan. They found that the cultivated varieties shared at least one pollinator species with 88% of the co‐flowering plant species in their study area, including wild papaya plants.…”

Las abejas sin aguijón (Tribu Meliponini) en los agroecosistemas de América Latina

“…La interacción planta-abeja, sin duda forma parte de una historia coevolutiva importante, como mencionan Bloch et al (2017), las plantas han desarrollado algunas características para facilitar la polinización por las abejas como son: el color, el aroma y la apertura de las flores, así como la producción de recompensas para los polinizadores, tales como néctar, polen y resinas. Estas interacciones entre plantas y abejas sin aguijón contribuyen en la polinización de los agroecosistemas (Kevan y Silva, 2020), lo cual se torna importante debido a que entre 75 y 84% de las especies cultivadas dependen de la polinización para la producción de frutos y semillas (Meléndez et al, 2018;Badillo-Montaño et al, 2019). (Friese, 1900), utilizan materiales antropogénicos como material de anidación (Vieira et al, 2016).…”