TY - JOUR
T1 - Pollination of a threatened orchid by an introduced hawk moth species in the tallgrass prairie of North America
AU - Fox, Kristina
AU - Vitt, Pati
AU - Anderson, Kirk
AU - Fauske, Gerald
AU - Travers, Steven
AU - Vik, Dean
AU - Harris, Marion O.
N1 - Funding Information:
This work was supported in part by a grant from the National Institutes of Health GM-32543, National Science Foundation DMB-8609654 and DMB-8501824, a 1984 Searle's Scholarship, and an Alfred P. Sloan Fellowship. Additional support was obtained from the Center of High Technology and Materials, UNM. C. Bustamante is a 1984 Searle Scholar and a 1985 Alfred P. Sloan Fellow. Received for publication 14 April and in final form 7 August 1987.
PY - 2013/11
Y1 - 2013/11
N2 - The decline of the threatened western prairie fringed orchid (Platanthera praeclara Sheviak and Bowles) is associated with destruction of the tallgrass prairie in North America. The role of pollinators in conservation and recovery is not well understood. We studied interactions with hawk moth pollinators in one of the three remaining metapopulations of P. praeclara. In an experiment, plants exposed to moths showed three signs of visitation that were associated with production of seed capsules. Plants not exposed to moths failed to produce capsules. The signs of visitation were used to estimate visitation rates at field sites over a four-year period. A majority of plants were visited (89%) and most flowers receiving pollen produced a seed capsule (60%). We discovered two new native hawk moth pollinator species, Lintneria eremitus (Hübner) and Hyles lineata (Fabricius), giving a total of five pollinators for this P. praeclara metapopulation. Only one of the five species was found in each of the nine years of trapping. This was the sole non-native pollinator, Hyles euphorbiae L., a Eurasian species introduced to North America to control an invasive weed, leafy spurge (Euphorbia esula L.).Given that plants with a greater diversity of pollinators have reduced risk of extinction, conservation and recovery plans should expand the definition of suitable P. praeclara habitat to include resources required by native pollinators, including the host plants that feed hawk moth larvae and the nectar plants that feed hawk moth adults before and after the nectar provided by P. praeclara.
AB - The decline of the threatened western prairie fringed orchid (Platanthera praeclara Sheviak and Bowles) is associated with destruction of the tallgrass prairie in North America. The role of pollinators in conservation and recovery is not well understood. We studied interactions with hawk moth pollinators in one of the three remaining metapopulations of P. praeclara. In an experiment, plants exposed to moths showed three signs of visitation that were associated with production of seed capsules. Plants not exposed to moths failed to produce capsules. The signs of visitation were used to estimate visitation rates at field sites over a four-year period. A majority of plants were visited (89%) and most flowers receiving pollen produced a seed capsule (60%). We discovered two new native hawk moth pollinator species, Lintneria eremitus (Hübner) and Hyles lineata (Fabricius), giving a total of five pollinators for this P. praeclara metapopulation. Only one of the five species was found in each of the nine years of trapping. This was the sole non-native pollinator, Hyles euphorbiae L., a Eurasian species introduced to North America to control an invasive weed, leafy spurge (Euphorbia esula L.).Given that plants with a greater diversity of pollinators have reduced risk of extinction, conservation and recovery plans should expand the definition of suitable P. praeclara habitat to include resources required by native pollinators, including the host plants that feed hawk moth larvae and the nectar plants that feed hawk moth adults before and after the nectar provided by P. praeclara.
KW - Life history requirements
KW - Plant conservation
KW - Plant mating systems
KW - Pollen-limited reproductive failure
KW - Pollinator decline
KW - Pollinator-plant interactions
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U2 - 10.1016/j.biocon.2013.08.026
DO - 10.1016/j.biocon.2013.08.026
M3 - Article
AN - SCOPUS:84884330543
SN - 0006-3207
VL - 167
SP - 316
EP - 324
JO - Biological Conservation
JF - Biological Conservation
ER -