Category: Plants & Animals
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Flowers That Select Birds For Pollination
The study has shown for the first time how certain Australian native flowers are attracting the birds rather than the bees. Essentially, newly evolved spectral signatures entice birds with the hues of red they are especially good at discriminating
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Pollinator Crisis 110 Million Years Ago
Amber from Cretaceous deposits (110-105 my) in Northern Spain has revealed the first ever record of insect pollination. Scientists have discovered in two pieces of amber several specimens of tiny insects covered with pollen grains, revealing the first record of pollen transport and social behavior in this group of animals.
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There Is No Substitute For Elephants As Seed Dispersers
The progressive disappearance of seed-dispersing animals like elephants and rhinoceroses puts the structural integrity and biodiversity of the tropical forest of South-East Asia at risk. With the help of Spanish researchers, an international team of experts has confirmed that not even herbivores like tapirs can replace them.
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Birds Garden To Attract Mates
Aside from humans, the spotted bowerbird is the only other animal that grows a plant for purposes other than food
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Climate Change Driving Elk To Decimate Mountain Forests
The densities of seasonal woodsy plants, including aspen and maple trees, in the northern Arizona mountains have steadily declined over the last two decades… this decline is primarily the result of one of two things: decreased soil water or increased exposure to hungry elk.
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Seed Disperser Crisis Rivals Pollinator Crisis
Climate change, fragmentation and animal declines are driving the seed dispersal process to the brink of extinction in most human-modified landscapes today.
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Hairy Crab Farms On Its Arms
In the deep ocean off the coast of Costa Rica, scientists have found a species of crab that cultivates gardens of bacteria on its claws, then eats them.
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Birds Disperse Seeds Previously Eaten By Their Prey
Although predatory birds are obviously not typical frugivores, they can play an important role in the seed dispersal processes of many plant species, acting as primary or secondary seed dispersers.
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Lemurs The Key To Madagascar’s Carbon-Storage
If the trees that produce large seeds don’t get their seeds dispersed—a likely scenario if large seed-dispersing animals like ruffed lemurs disappear—they begin to die out. Species with small seeds that can be dispersed by many animals, and species with wind-dispersed seeds, may then gain a competitive advantage and begin to dominate the forest. The forest becomes one composed mainly of trees with low carbon-storage potential, and the carbon-storage capacity of the whole forest is affected.
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When Pollinators Can’t Be Depended On
What if a plant happens to grow in a population that is small or has very few pollinators visiting its flowers? Will all the effort put into flowering and attracting pollinators have gone to waste? Some plants, including a bright pink, short-lived, western European herb, have found a way to ensure their future reproductive fitness despite such limitations