Title :

Effects of sexual dimorphism on pollinator behaviour in a dioecious species

Author(s) :

Moquet, Laura [Auteur]
Département Systèmes Biologiques [Cirad-BIOS]
Peuplements végétaux et bioagresseurs en milieu tropical [UMR PVBMT]
Évolution, Écologie et Paléontologie (Evo-Eco-Paleo) - UMR 8198 [Evo-Eco-Paléo (EEP)]
Jacquemart, Anne‐laure [Auteur]
Earth and Life Institute - Environmental Sciences [ELIE]
Dufay, Mathilde [Auteur correspondant]
Centre d’Ecologie Fonctionnelle et Evolutive [CEFE]
Évolution, Écologie et Paléontologie (Evo-Eco-Paleo) - UMR 8198 [Evo-Eco-Paléo (EEP)]
De Cauwer, Isabelle [Auteur]
Évolution, Écologie et Paléontologie (Evo-Eco-Paleo) - UMR 8198 [Evo-Eco-Paléo (EEP)]

Journal title :

Oikos

Pages :

e08662

Publisher :

Nordic Ecological Society

Publication date :

2022-03

ISSN :

0030-1299

English keyword(s) :

dioecy
floral trait sexual dimorphism
pollen transfer
pollination
Silene dioica
visitation sequence

HAL domain(s) :

Sciences du Vivant [q-bio]/Génétique/Génétique des populations [q-bio.PE]

English abstract : [en]

Floral traits often display sexual dimorphism in insect-pollinated dioecious plant species, with male individuals typically being showier than females. While this strategy is theorized to be optimal when pollinators are ...
Show more >Floral traits often display sexual dimorphism in insect-pollinated dioecious plant species, with male individuals typically being showier than females. While this strategy is theorized to be optimal when pollinators are abundant, it might represent a risk when they become scarce, because the disproportionately high number of visits on the most attractive sex, males, might preclude efficient pollen transfer from males to females. Here, the effect of sexual dimorphism on pollination efficiency was assessed in experimental arrays of dioecious Silene dioica that were exposed to one frequent visitor of the species, Bombus terrestris, and that differed in the magnitude of sexual dimorphism for either flower number or flower size. We found that flower number dimorphism negatively affected the number of visits on female plants, on female flowers and on the number of female flowers visited after a male flower. However, flower number dimorphism had no effect on the number of pollen grains deposited per stigma, presumably because the decrease in the number of visits to female flowers was compensated by a higher number of pollen grains deposited per visit. Flower size dimorphism did not affect visitation patterns and pollen transfer in our experimental arrays. These results highlight the need to jointly study visitation patterns and pollen receipt on stigmas when exploring the effect on floral phenotypes on pollination efficiency.Show less >

Language :

Anglais

Popular science :

Non

Comment :

Data are available from the Dryad Digital Repository: <https://doi.org/10.5061/dryad.nzs7h44sx> (Moquet et al. 2021).

Collections :

• Évolution, Écologie et Paléontologie (Evo Eco Paleo) - UMR 8198

Source :

Harvested from HAL