Touch-sensitive stamens enhance pollen dispersal by scaring away visitors.

ABSTRACT: Animal-pollinated plants have to get pollen to a conspecific stigma while protecting it from getting eaten. Touch-sensitive stamens, which are found in hundreds of flowering plants, are thought to function in enhancing pollen export and reducing its loss, but experimental tests are scarce. Stamens of Berberis and Mahonia are inserted between paired nectar glands and when touched by an insect's tongue rapidly snap forward so that their valvate anthers press pollen on the insect's tongue or face. We immobilized the stamens in otherwise unmodified flowers and studied pollen transfer in the field and under enclosed conditions. On flowers with immobilized stamens, the most common bee visitor stayed up to 3.6× longer, yet removed 1.3× fewer pollen grains and deposited 2.1× fewer gr

SUBMITTER: Li DF 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC9555859 | biostudies-literature | 2022 Oct

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature