pollination ecology: past, present, and...
TRANSCRIPT
Johnny Randall
Director of Conservation Programs
North Carolina Botanical GardenThe University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
Pollination Ecology:
Past, Present, and Future
Outline• Pollination primer
• Pollination biology history
– From the Cradle of Civilization to the present
• Our Forgotten Pollinators
– Tales of neglect and decline
• Pollination studies
– Competition for pollination
• Saving our pollinators
A species of Aedes mosquito pollinates
a rare orchid, Platanthera obtusata, he
finally had an answer—and an opportunity
to show “a less clichéd example of an
animal fertilizing a flower.” But making this
image of the mosquito lifting off the orchid
in Minnesota—with pollen stuck to its snout
and a red mite nearby—proved perilous.
Fun facts- Bee species world wide = 32,000
- Bee species in the United States = 4,000
- Over 85% of flowering plants are pollinated
by insects – and 90% of these insects are bees
- Other insect pollinators include butterflies, moths,
beetles, and flies
- Thank a bee for one
out of every three
bites of food
Bidens aristosa
(ditch daisy or tick-seed)
Catalpa speciose
(Indian cigar tree)
Specialist vs generalist
floral morphologies
It is interesting to contemplate an entangled bank, clothed with many plants of many kinds, with birds singing on the bushes, with various insects flitting about, and with worms crawling through the damp earth, and to reflect that these elaborately constructed forms, so different from each other, and dependent on each other in so complex a manner, have all been produced by laws acting around us.
Charles Darwin –
On the Origin of Species by Means of Natural Selection, or the
Preservation of Favoured Races in the Struggle for Life (1859)
"I have just received such a box full from Mr.
Bateman with the astounding Angraecum
sesquipedalia with a nectary a foot long. Good
Heavens what insect can suck it“.. “In
Madagascar there must be moths with
probosces capable of extension to a length of
between ten and eleven inches."
Charles Darwin
Robertson’s forb-bee interaction
network of 532 unique interactions
Laura A. Burkle et al. Science 2013;339:1611-1615
Published by AAAS
Black lines (125 of 532 interactions; 24%)
are interactions observed in Robertson’s
time and persisted to the present; red lines
(183 of 532; 34%) are interactions that
were lost through the extirpation of bee
species; and blue lines (224 of 532; 42%)
are cases where interactions were lost for
other reasons. Bee species in red are
extirpated.
Competition for Pollination
Any interaction in which co-occurring plant species suffer reduced
reproductive success because they share pollinators.
Adapted from Wasser 1983
Pollination ecology of
the simultaneously flowering
Impatiens capensis and
I. pallida (Balsaminaceae)
Competition for pollination between native and non-native plants
• Ludwigia linifolia vs L. peruviana
• Clethra alnifolia vs C. barbinervis
• Hydrangea arborescens vs H. macrophylla
• Hydrangea radiata vs H. macrophylla
• Callicarpa americana vs C. dichotoma
What’s bugging our pollinators?
- Habitat loss
- Plants
- Pollinators
- “Pollution”
- Invasive plants
- Ecosystem fragmentation and disruption
- Parasites (e.g. mite Varroa destructor)
- Diseases
- Overzealous pesticide and fungicide use
- Broad spectrum poisons over decades
- More recently neonicotinoids (neonics)
- Introduced bee species
The tale of the invasive garlic mustard and the endangered
Virginia white butterfly (Pieris virginiensis)
Rebuilding Nature’s RelationshipsDoug Tallamy and Rick Darke
Jenny Fitch LectureSunday, September 27, 2:00-4:45
- minimize ground disturbance
- practice zeroscaping by using the existing vegetation
- protect streams
- identify and protect important features such as vernal pools, rare plant sites, pollinator habitat (= dead trees and bare ground)
- choose the right plant for the right spot (duh!)
- attempt to recreate natural relationships (i.e., mimic nature to the greatest extent possible)
- maximize plant diversity and sequentially flowering species
- increase the use of natives and reduce the use of exotics (particularly known invasives)
Ecologically designed landscapes
Think – “to have a conscious mind, to some
extent of reasoning, remembering experiences,
making rational decisions, etc.”
Partners for Fish and Wildlife grant to
grow 7,200 plugs of common milkweed
(Asclepias syriaca) for future distribution
and to create a local seed source
for additional monarch habitat projects
And we will augment existing populations of A. incarnata var. pulchra, A. amplexicaulis, A. tuberosa var. tuberosa, and A. viridifloraat the Mason Farm Biological Reserve and at the Penny’s Bend Nature Preserve
If you would be happy for a week, take a wife (or husband).
If you would be happyfor a month, kill a pig.
If you would be happyfor all your life, planta garden.
Chinese Proverb
Some Town NC
Viburnum species
(Viburnum dentatum, V. acerifolium, and V. rufidulum)
Mountain laurel
(Kalmia latifolia)
American wisteria (Wisteria frutescens)
Crossvine (Bignonia capreolata)
Yellow jessamine
(Gelsemium sempervirens)
Coral honeysuckle (Lonicera sempervirens)
North Carolina
state wildflower –
Carolina lily
(Lilium michauxii)
New England aster
(Symphotrichum novae angliae)