Floral nectar microbial communities exhibit seasonal shifts associated with extreme heat: Potential implications for climate change and plant-pollinator interactions.

ABSTRACT: Floral nectar contains vital nutrients for pollinators, including sugars, amino acids, proteins, and secondary compounds. As pollinators forage, they inoculate nectar with bacteria and fungi. These microbes can colonize nectaries and alter nectar properties, including volume and chemistry. Abiotic factors, such as temperature, can influence microbial community structure and nectar traits. Considering current climate change conditions, studying the effects of increased temperature on ecosystem processes like pollination is ever more important. In a manipulative field experiment, we used a passive-heating technique to increase the ambient temperature of a California native plant, Penstemon heterophyllus, to test the hypothesis that temperatures elevated an average of 0.5°C will affect

SUBMITTER: Russell KA 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC9453676 | biostudies-literature | 2022

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature