Wildflowers shorten their bloom time when pollinators visit more often
Spigler RB, Ostrowski S
Pollinators
If you've noticed some blooms in your garden fade fast while others linger for days, pollinator visits and dry air, not just genetics, may be calling the shots on when each flower closes up shop.
Researchers controlled how much pollen landed on a wild pink-flowered plant called rosepink and watched how long individual blooms stayed open. When pollen arrived often, flowers wilted faster and their lifespans became more uniform; when pollen was scarce, flower lifespans varied more and dry air (low humidity) made them close even sooner. The plant also showed a tradeoff: making more flowers meant each one lasted a shorter time, while bigger flowers tended to stick around longer, no matter the pollination conditions.
Key Findings
Mean and variance in floral longevity both declined as pollen deposition rates increased, compressing the range of flower lifespans
A flower lifespan-number tradeoff and a positive lifespan-size relationship held true regardless of pollination treatment
Vapor pressure deficit (dry air) shortened flower life most under low pollen deposition, exactly when natural selection would favor longer-lived flowers
Floral longevity had only weak, inconsistent effects on the risk of seeds being eaten by predators before dispersal
chevron_right Technical Summary
Flowers of a wildflower called rosepink stay open longer when fewer pollinators visit them, and open shorter when pollination is frequent, showing that how long a flower lasts isn't fixed but shifts with real-world conditions like humidity and pollinator traffic.
Abstract Preview
Original paper
Pollination context and abiotic stress reshape variation in floral longevity and its exposure to selection.
Floral longevity is thought to evolve by natural selection imposed by pollinators and resource constraints acting on heritable phenotypic variation. In species with pollination-induced wilting, pol...
open_in_new Read full abstractAbstract copyright held by the original publisher.
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Sabatia angularis, commonly called rosepink, rose pink, square-stem rose pink or rose gentian, is a biennial flowering plant in the Gentianaceae (gentain) family. It is native to central and eastern North America.