Hostname: page-component-7c8c6479df-94d59 Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-03-17T18:33:20.831Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

Pollen larceny of the tropical weed Solanum torvum by a Fijian endemic halictine bee with implications for the spread of plants with specialized pollinator requirements

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  03 May 2017

Morgan Staines
Affiliation:
School of Biological Sciences, Flinders University, GPO Box 2100, Adelaide SA 5001, Australia
Cathy Vo
Affiliation:
School of Biological Sciences, Flinders University, GPO Box 2100, Adelaide SA 5001, Australia
Natalie Puiu
Affiliation:
School of Biological Sciences, Flinders University, GPO Box 2100, Adelaide SA 5001, Australia
Sarah Hayes
Affiliation:
School of Biological Sciences, Flinders University, GPO Box 2100, Adelaide SA 5001, Australia
Marika Tuiwawa
Affiliation:
South Pacific Regional Herbarium, University of the South Pacific, PO Box 1168, Suva, Fiji
Mark I. Stevens*
Affiliation:
South Australian Museum, GPO Box 234, Adelaide, SA 5000, Australia School of Pharmacy and Medical Sciences, University of South Australia, Adelaide, SA, Australia
Michael P. Schwarz
Affiliation:
School of Biological Sciences, Flinders University, GPO Box 2100, Adelaide SA 5001, Australia
*
*Corresponding author. Email: mark.stevens@samuseum.sa.gov.au

Abstract:

The ability of plants to colonize new habitats is influenced by their dependence on effective pollinators. This can be very important for plants that require specialized pollinators, especially when they disperse to islands that have low pollinator diversity. One form of specialization involves plants that require buzz-pollination, where bees must vibrate poricidal anthers at frequencies that allow pollen to be released. Pollen larceny is a phenomenon where insects ‘steal’ pollen from flowers which usually results in reduced pollination, but in some cases there can be a small contribution to pollination. Here we report pollen larceny in an endemic Fijian halictine bee Homalictus fijiensis that steals pollen by chewing anthers of the invasive weed Solanum torvum, which is a pollen-only plant requiring buzz pollination. In over nine hours of observations at six sites where H. fijiensis visited S. torvum, it never attempted to locate nectaries, it never buzzed anthers, and instead chewed anther tips, indicating an adaptation to exploit nectarless flowers with poricidal anthers without buzz-pollination. Analyses of 30 pollen loads from H. fijiensis collected from S. torvum flowers indicate 27 of these contained S. torvum pollen, ranging from 1% to 99% of total pollen, indicating it is a pollen vector for this plant. Our findings support arguments that super-generalist pollinators in island ecosystems can promote the spread of invasive plants, but go further by indicating that super-generalist strategies can extend to plants with highly specialized pollinator requirements.

Type
Research Article
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2017 

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

Footnotes

Equal contributions.

References

LITERATURE CITED

DE LUCA, P. A. & VALLEJO-MARÍN, M. 2013. What's the ‘buzz’ about? The ecology and evolutionary significance of buzz-pollination. Current Opinion in Plant Biology 16:429435.Google Scholar
FENSTER, C. B., ARMBRUSTER, W. S., WILSON, P., DUDASH, M. R. & THOMSON, J. D. 2004. Pollination syndromes and floral specialization. Annual Review of Ecology, Evolution and Systematics 35:375403.Google Scholar
GROOM, S. V. C. & SCHWARZ, M. P. 2011. Bees in the Southwest Pacific: origins, diversity and conservation. Pacific Science 67:561570.Google Scholar
GROOM, S. V. C., STEVENS, M. I. & SCHWARZ, M. P. 2013. Diversification of Fijian halictine bees: insights into a recent island radiation. Molecular Phylogenetics and Evolution 68:582594.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
HARGREAVES, A. L., HARDER, L. D. & JOHNSON, S. D. 2009. Consumptive emasculation: the ecological and evolutionary consequences of pollen theft. Biological Reviews 84:259276.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
HAYES, S. E. 2016. Plant-pollinator networks on Viti Levu, Fiji. Differences in network structure and resilience between highlands and lowlands. BSc (Hons) thesis, School of Biological Sciences, Flinders University, Adelaide, Australia Google Scholar
LIM, T. K. 2013. Edible medicinal and non-medicinal plants: Volume 6, Fruits. Springer Verlag, Dordrecht.Google Scholar
LIU, H. & PEMBERTON, R. W. 2009. Solitary invasive orchid bee outperforms co-occurring native bees to promote fruit set of an invasive Solanum . Oecologia 159:515525.Google Scholar
MATAKI, M., KOSHY, K. C. & LAL, M. 2006. Baseline climatology of Viti Levu (Fiji) and current climatic trends. Pacific Science 60:4968.Google Scholar
MICHENER, C. D. 1979. The genus Homalictus in Fiji (Hymenoptera: Halicitidae). Pacific Insects 21:227234.Google Scholar
MICHENER, C. D. 2007. The bees of the World. Johns Hopkins University Press, Baltimore. 992 pp.Google Scholar
MEYER, J.-Y. 2000. Preliminary review of the invasive pans in the pacific islands. Pp. 85114 in Sherley, G. (ed.). Invasive species in the Pacific: a technical review and draft strategy. South Pacific Regional Environment Programme, Apia, Samoa.Google Scholar
OLESEN, J. M., ESKILDSEN, L. I. & VENKATASAMY, S. 2002. Invasion of pollination networks on oceanic islands: importance of invader complexes and endemic super generalists. Diversity and Distributions 8:181192.Google Scholar
PARHAM, J. W. 1958. The weeds of Fiji. Fiji. Department of Agriculture. Bulletin 35.Google Scholar
RENNER, S. 1983. The widespread occurrence of anther destruction by Trigona bees in Melastomataceae. Biotropica 15:251256.Google Scholar
SMITH, A. C. 1988. Flora vitiensis nova: a new flora of Fiji (Spermatophytes only): Volume 4. Pacific Tropical Botanical Garden, Kauai, Hawaii.Google Scholar
SOLIS-MONTERO, L., VERGARA, C. H. & VALLEJO-MARIN, M. 2015. High incidence of pollen theft in natural populations of a buzz-pollinated plant. Arthropod–Plant Interactions 9:599611.Google Scholar
TUIWAWA, M. 2005. Recent changes in the upland watershed forest of Monasavu, a cloud forest site along the PABITRA gateway transect on Viti Levu, Fiji. Pacific Science 59:159163.Google Scholar
VILLANUEVA-GUTIERREZ, R., QUEZADA-EUAN, J. & ELTZ, T. 2013. Pollen diets of two sibling orchid bee species, Euglossa, in Yucatán, southern Mexico. Apidologie 44:440446.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
WHISTLER, W. A. 1995. Wayside plants of the islands. Isle Botanica, Honolulu, Hawaii. 202 pp.Google Scholar

Staines supplementary material

Staines supplementary material 1

Download Staines supplementary material(Video)
Video 20.4 MB