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opencc-zeroDec 2013View details →

Data from: Intraspecific divergence and convergence of floral tube length in specialized pollination interactions

Floral tubes are often thought to be a consequence of adaptive specialization towards pollinator morphology. We explore floral tube length evolution within Tritoniopsis revoluta (Iridaceae), a species with considerable geographical tube length variation. We ask whether tube lengths of T. revoluta populations are associated with pollinator proboscis lengths, whether floral divergence occurs in the presence of different pollinators and whether floral convergence occurs between distantly related populations pollinated by the same pollinator. Finally, we ask whether tube length evolution is directional. Shifts between morphologically different pollinators were always associated with shifts in floral morphology, even when populations were very closely related. Distantly related populations had similar tube lengths when they were pollinated by the same pollinator. Shifts in tube length tended to be from short to long, although reversals were not infrequent. After correcting for the population-level phylogeny, there was a strong positive, linear relationship between floral tube length and pollinator proboscis length, suggesting that plants are functionally specialized on different pollinators at different sites. However, because tube length evolution in this system can be a bidirectional process, specialization to the local pollinator fauna is unlikely to result in evolutionary or ecological dead-ends such as canalization or range limitation.

opencc-zeroNov 2023View details →

Effects of herbivory and pathogen infection on plant-pollinator interactions

Plant enemies can indirectly affect pollinators by modifying plant traits, but simultaneous tests of herbivore and pathogen effects are lacking, and the role of floral volatiles has seldom been mechanistically assessed. In this study, we tested for indirect effects of insect herbivores and pathogens on pollinator attraction via altered floral volatile emissions, and its consequences for plant fitness in Brassica rapa. Plants in the field were exposed to either no damage or damage by caterpillars (Mamestra brassicae), aphids (Brevicoryne brassicae), a leaf fungus (Sclerotinia sclerotiorum), or a bacterium (Xanthomonas campestris pv. campestris). We recorded pollinator visits, and measured floral traits (flower number, volatiles) and plant fitness-correlates. We additionally performed a greenhouse experiment with artificial emitters to test for effects of target floral volatiles on pollinator attraction. In the field experiments, plants subjected to herbivory by the aphid B. brassicae (but not the other enemies) exhibited a marked reduction in the emission of two VOCs (nonanal and 2-butyl-1-octanol), experienced lower pollinator visits, and produced seeds of lower quality in terms of seed biomass and germination rate, while flower output itself was not affected. Artificial emitters with reduced amounts of these compounds were less attractive to pollinators under greenhouse conditions. Synthesis: These results provide strong evidence for volatile-mediated indirect interactions between plant enemies and pollinators ultimately impacting plant fitness, and further point at enemy and compound specificity underlying such effects.

opencc-zeroJan 2022View details →

Relative species abundance successfully predicts nestedness and interaction frequency of monthly pollination networks in an alpine meadow

Plant-pollinator networks have been repeatedly reported as cumulative ones that are described with >1 years observations. However, such cumulative networks are composed of pairwise interactions recorded at different periods, and thus may not be able to reflect the reality of species interactions in nature (e.g., early-flowering plants typically do not compete for shared pollinators with late-flowering plants, but they are assumed to do so in accumulated networks). Here, we examine the monthly sampling structure of an alpine plant-pollinator bipartite network over a two-year period to determine whether relative species abundance and species traits better explain the network structure of monthly networks than yearly ones. Although community composition and species abundance varied from one month to another, the monthly networks (as well as the yearly networks described with annual pooled data) had a highly nested structure, in which specialists directly interact with generalist partners. Moreover, relative species abundance predicted the nestedness in both the monthly and yearly networks and accounted for a statistically significant percentage of the variation (i.e., 20%-44%) in the pairwise interactions of monthly networks, but not yearly networks. The combination of relative species abundance and species traits (but not species traits only) showed a similar prediction power in terms of both network nestedness and pairwise interaction frequencies. Considering the previously recognized structural pattern and associated mechanisms of plant-pollinator networks, we propose that relative species abundance may be an important factor influencing both nestedness and interaction frequency of pollination networks.

opencc-zeroJun 2022View details →

Plant and pollinator interactions from British Columbia from Oak Savannah, Shrub-Steppe, and restored hedgerows

This dataset contains the data analyzed in "Guzman, L.M., Chamberlain, S. and Elle, E. (2021) Network robustness and structure depends on the phenological characteristics of plants and pollinators. Ecology and Evolution" The data comprises plant-pollinator interactions collected in three ecosystems (Oak Savannah, Shrub-Steppe and restored hedgerows) from British Columbia. These three vegetation types comprised three different studies. The average distance between sites within studies was 19km, 18km and 29km for the oak savannah, shrub-steppe and hedgerows respectively. For simplicity we use "pollinator" throughout this paper to refer to insects and hummingbirds observed visiting flowers and contacting reproductive organs, although their effectiveness at transfer of pollen has not been assessed. The networks were comprised largely of bees, with wasps and hoverflies also common. Less common were butterflies and beetles. The plants were largely forbs with some shrubs; insect-pollinated trees were not sampled for largely logistical reasons of tree height but tended to be uncommon in these ecosystems.

opencc-zeroDec 2021View details →

A dataset for pollinator diversity and their interactions with plants in the Pacific NorthWest

Pollinator populations have declined substantially in recent years. The resulting loss in pollination services has both ecological and economic consequences including reductions in plant diversity and crop production and lower food security. Datasets that identify pollinators and their plant hosts are of utmost importance in order to understand the main causes of pollinator declines. Here we present a dataset, which contains 67,954 individual pollinator records. The data has been collected across the Pacific Northwest, primarily focused in British Columbia (Canada), with 182 individual sites over 11 years, between 2005 and 2017. This dataset comprises multiple studies that aimed to collect information on pollinator abundance, diversity and their interactions with plants. Overall, the dataset includes 937 morphospecies (of which 482 were identified to species) of pollinators across 105 families, including data for bees, wasps, butterflies, moths and flies. We also present information on the interactions of these species, with 473 species of plants. This data set is released for non-commercial use only. Credits should be given to this paper (i.e., proper citation).

opencc-zeroAug 2022View details →

Habitat loss increases seasonal interaction rewiring in plant-pollinator networks

Understanding the flexibility of interactions and network rewiring (i.e. reassembly of interactions due to partner-switching) is necessary to comprehend how future anthropogenic changes will affect interspecific interactions and the functioning of communities. A higher rewiring could be expected in more disturbed landscapes because these landscapes contain fewer and more generalist species with more homogeneous traits. We sampled pollination interactions in 20 wild Olea europaea communities along a disturbance gradient to evaluate the hypothesis that the loss of natural habitats increases seasonal (within-year) interaction rewiring in plant-pollinator communities, influencing their functional structure. For this, we particularly tested whether rewiring frequency was negatively related to the extent of natural habitats surrounding the communities, whether interaction rewiring influenced the static structure of networks (nestedness, network specialization –H2'–), and whether a high generalization (low specialization –d'–) and abundance of species in communities made them more prone to rewiring. We show that habitat loss increased seasonal interaction rewiring in networks. Changes in rewiring were related to changes in the cumulative static structure of pollination networks. Nestedness decreased and network specialization (H2') also tended to decrease as interaction rewiring increased, suggesting an indirect effect of habitat loss on the robustness of networks through their dynamics. As expected, generalist insect and plant species were more prone to rewiring. However, flower abundance had different effects on the rewiring probability of plant species depending on the extent of habitat loss, with abundant species rewiring more in disturbed communities and rewiring less in more natural communities. Likely, this is related to the context-dependent foraging behaviour of pollinators, which may switch to more abundant species if the cost of searching for trait-matching resources is high in disturbed habitats. Our work shows the role of partner-switching in generalist species to adapt to new conditions. It also highlights the importance of going beyond general network metrics to understand the underlying processes of community-level interaction assembly, and predict and anticipate the effects of anthropogenic disturbances on pollination services.

opencc-by-4.0Jan 2019View details →

Does phenology explain plant-pollinator interactions at different latitudes? An assessment of its explanatory power in plant-hoverfly networks in French calcareous grasslands

These are the data supporting the results in the paper entitled:  "Does phenology explain plant-pollinator interactions at different latitudes? An assessment of its explanatory power in plant-hoverfly networks in French calcareous grasslands" Authors: Natasha de Manincor¹*, Nina Hautekeete¹, Yves Piquot¹, Bertrand Schatz², Cédric Vanappelghem³, François Massol¹,4

opencc-zeroDec 2015View details →

Data from: Influence of plant-pollinator interactions on the assembly of plant and hummingbird communities

Understanding how ecological processes structure species assemblages is a central issue in community ecology. While the influence of plant–pollinator interactions on each other's evolution is well recognized, their role in the assembly of interdependent communities of plants and pollinators is still unclear. Using data from seven communities of hummingbirds and plants that they pollinate from two tropical rain forest types (lowland and montane), we evaluated phylogenetic relationships and signal of functional traits, over space and time, to test predictions on the main processes (environmental filtering, facilitation or competition) that are driving these hummingbird–plant assemblages. Our findings suggest that the main processes driving these assemblages varied between hummingbirds and plants and between habitats, and even among communities at the same habitat. The non-conserved floral trait and the phylogenetic patterns (even or random) give support to the hypothesis of facilitation or competition as processes regulating the composition of plant assemblages. Moreover, the positive relationship between fitness and flowering synchrony suggests facilitation as the most important mechanism for montane plant communities. Distinctively, for lowland plant communities, the combination of non-conserved traits and clustered phylogenetic patterns may be a result of either adaptive radiation or biotic filtering driven by a particular pollinator species that plays a main role as plant community organizer. Lastly, evidence of trait conservatism, together with clustered or even phylogenetic patterns, suggests that facilitation or competition may drive the assembly of montane hummingbird communities, despite the predominance of random phylogenetic patterns. Synthesis. Overall, we present a pathway to identify central ecological processes that may drive the assembly of plant–pollinator communities. We show that different processes related with pollination that vary in space and time may contribute to the assembly of the interdependent tropical communities of plants and pollinators. These findings highlight the importance of considering ecological interactions when evaluating community assembly processes.

Figure 14. A in Community-level plant-pollinator interactions in a Palaeotropical montane evergreen oak forest ecosystem

Figure 14. A relationship between fore wing length and tongue length of the observed bees and syrphid flies.

Figure 13. A in Community-level plant-pollinator interactions in a Palaeotropical montane evergreen oak forest ecosystem

Figure 13. A scatter chart of non-metric multidimensional scaling (NMDS) ordination of flower-visitor assemblages (stress value = 0.22). Pearson and Kendall correlations of 13 guilds with ordination axes are shown in red arrows.

Figure 17 in Community-level plant-pollinator interactions in a Palaeotropical montane evergreen oak forest ecosystem

Figure 17. Comparison of pollination systems among different habits of the plants observed in the montane forests in Laos.

Figure 9 in Community-level plant-pollinator interactions in a Palaeotropical montane evergreen oak forest ecosystem

Figure 9. Flowers visited by dipterans. (a) Curculigo crassifolia visited by a syrphid fly; (b) Lindera tonkinensis visited by a muscid fly; (c) Flueggea virosa visited by a mosquito; (d) Breynia retusa visited by a cecidomyiid midge; (e) Isodon coetsa visited by a syrphid fly; (f) Arisaema balansae visited by a mycetophilid midge (spathe dissected); (g, h) Alocasia odora visited by a drosophilid fly; (i) Maesa sp. visited by a sciarid midge.

Figure 7 in Community-level plant-pollinator interactions in a Palaeotropical montane evergreen oak forest ecosystem

Figure 7. Flowers visited by long-tongued bees and flies. (a) Derris scandens visited by Bombus sp.; (b) Amalocalyx microlobus visited by Bombus trifasciatus; (c) Zingiber zerumbet visited by B. trifasciatus; (d, e) Myrioneuron faberi visited by Elaphropoda; (f) Alpinia kwangsiensis visited by Xylocopa caerulea; (g) Phlogacanthus sp. visited by long-tongued syrphid fly.

Figure 5 in Community-level plant-pollinator interactions in a Palaeotropical montane evergreen oak forest ecosystem

Figure 5. Seasonal changes in numbers of bees observed on flowers: (a) honeybees of subgenera Megapis and Apis; (b) honeybees of subgenus Micrapis and stingless bees; (c) bumblebees; (d) Anthophorini; (e) Xylocopini, Ctenoplectini and Megachilidae; (f) Halictidae, Colletidae and Melittidae.

Figure 4 in Community-level plant-pollinator interactions in a Palaeotropical montane evergreen oak forest ecosystem

Figure 4. Seasonal changes in the number of observed flowering plant species at the study sites in Laos. The letter 'n' in the graph denotes a lack of data.

Figure 12 in Community-level plant-pollinator interactions in a Palaeotropical montane evergreen oak forest ecosystem

Figure 12. Flowers visited by thrips and bugs. (a, b) Chloranthus nervosus visited by thrips; (c) Mytilaria laosensis visited by thrips; (d, e) Dioscorea bulbifera visited by thrips; (f) Maesa sp., visited by a mecopteran; (g) Elatostema involucratum visited by a mirid bug; (h) Elatostema balansae visited by a mirid bug.

Figure 10 in Community-level plant-pollinator interactions in a Palaeotropical montane evergreen oak forest ecosystem

Figure 10. Flowers visited by beetles. (a, b) Fissistigma cupreonitens visited by chrysomelid beetles, an inner petal removed to show the inner chamber in (b); (c) Gentiana zollingeri visited by a scarabaeid beetle; (d) Melastoma malabathrica visited by scarabaeid beetles; (e) Photinia prunifolia visited by a scarabaeid beetle; (f) Lithocarpus elegans visited by a cerambycid beetle; (g) Euodia lepta visited by cerambycid beetles; (h) Photinia prunifolia visited by a cerambycid beetle; (i) Melastoma malabathrica visited by a meloid beetle, Mylabris phalerata; (j) Lithocarpus mucronata visited by a dermatid beetle; (k) Vitex leptobotrys visited by a curculionid beetle.

Figure 8 in Community-level plant-pollinator interactions in a Palaeotropical montane evergreen oak forest ecosystem

Figure 8. Flowers visited by small bees and wasps. (a) Embelia ribes visited by a stingless bee; (b) Thladiantha sp. visited by Ctenoplectra cornuta (visitor not in the photo); (c) Uncaria scandens visited by a halictid bee; (d) Sterculia henryi visited by a halictid bee; (e) Ludwigia hyssopifolia visited by a halictid bee; (f) Lysimachia siamensis visited by a Macropis orientalis bee; (g) Baliospermum montanum visited by a scoliid wasp; (h) Euphorbia lathyris visited by an ant; (i) Euodia lepta visited by an eumenid wasp; (j) Cynoglossum zeylanicum visited by an eumenid wasp; (k) Photinia prunifolia visited by an eumenid wasp.

Figure 2 in Community-level plant-pollinator interactions in a Palaeotropical montane evergreen oak forest ecosystem

Figure 2. Seasonal changes in monthly temperature (averages of monthly maximum, mean and minimum) and rainfall at Xam Neua near S4.

Figure 6 in Community-level plant-pollinator interactions in a Palaeotropical montane evergreen oak forest ecosystem

Figure 6. Flowers visited by honeybees: A. laboriosa (a–c), A. dorsata (d–f), Apis cerana (g–k) and A. florea (l). (a) Castanopsis diversifolia; (b) Castanopsis diversifolia; (c) Rubus multibracteatus; (d) Stachytarpheta jamaicensis; (E) Symplocos ramosissima; (f) Pogostemon nelsonii; (g) Ageratum houstonianum; (h) Photinia prunifolia; (i) Rubus obcordatus; (j) Bidens pilosa var. radiata; (k) Ixeris gracilis; (l) Photinia prunifolia.