Bat Pollination

Bats are important pollinators in the tropics. 

Queen of the night, Epiphyllum oxypetalum, bat-pollinated cactus
of the American tropics, now grown all over the world.
 Fitbit mini for scale. Flowers can be 12" long and 12" across

Pollination by Hummingbirds

Hummingbirds are a strictly New World group of birds, some 375 species (family Trochilidae) found from Alaska to southern Chile and Argentina. They are the main group of birds that pollinate in the New World. Fast and often brightly colored, people love to watch them. They typically hover while probing flowers for nectar, a fascinating sight. 

hummingbird pollinating Monarda

Pollinators and Flower Visitors

All sorts of small animals can be found on flowers. All of them can safely be called flower visitors. Of the flower visitors, some are pollinators. What is the difference?

Fly Pollination

 Flies don't get much respect, we think of them mainly as pests. However, they are important pollinators.

Moth Pollination 3. Settling Moths

Pollinating moths come from only a few of the 124 families of moths, as far as we know (part 1 of this series). The sphinx moths, family Sphingidae (part 2) are important pollinators that fly in the evening and even by day; they are really cool insects to watch. All the other pollinating moths are collectively called settling moths, because the land on the flowers and then probe for nectar, while sphinx moths hover. Settling moths are quite mysterious.

a settling moth, the bindweed or four-spotted moth,
Tyta luctosa Denis & Schiffermüller (Noctuidae) on a cosmos (Cosmos) flower

Butterfly Pollination, A Quick Overview

Long ago, when plants began exploiting animals to carry pollen between flowers, they encountered butterflies. Butterfly adults fed mainly on sugar water (nectar). Flowers adapted to this by offering little cups of nectar, positioned so that a feeding butterfly would get pollen on itself--on the proboscis or face or wings, depending on the flower--which then pollinated the next flower of the same species when the butterfly moved to find more nectar there. I said "exploit" but for most flowers and butterflies it is a reasonable trade, pollen movement for food, making butterflies a major group of pollinators.

swallowtail butterfly on mint flowers

Quick Overview of Bee Pollination

Bees are numerous and are good pollinators, so many plant species have flowers tailored to bees.

Bumblebee (Bombus) pollinating golden banner (Thermopsis montana)

Plants and Pollinators

 One of the ideas that attracted me to ecology as a student was pollination. In particular, the match between flowers and their visitors. Bees like open flowers like echinacea and bees can enter closed flowers like peas, but some flowers are too long and narrow for them to reach the nectar. This results in patterns in nature, plants that are mainly bee-pollinated, for example, and plants that are not pollinated by bees. And those bee-flowers share characteristics, so that you can recognize them, just as bees do. 

Bumblebee drinking nectar from golden banner (Thermopsis montana)

                                The pollen and stigma are hidden inside the lower lips of the flower,

                                   they bump into the bee's abdomen as it feeds, transferring pollen.

Looking at Flowers Like A Bee

Not all the bright flowers are equally attractive to a bee. Flower shapes are functional. They encourage pollination, but pollinators come in various shapes and sizes, so flowers fit some pollinators and not others. Which, if you take the insect's point-of-view, means some flowers are food sources and others are not. Bees like flowers they can land on and then climb into the flower, or walk across tiny flowers.

Pollinator Week--A Mountain Walk Looking for Pollinators

This was Pollinator Week.

Fly on wild rose

I hiked in Rocky Mountain National Park, taking time to watch the pollinators.

Plant Story -- Colorful Columbines, Aquilegia

Rocky Mountain columbines,
Aquilegia coerulea

Everybody knows columbine, right?

Columbines, Aquilegia species, are distinctive plants related to anemones and buttercups (in the buttercup family, Ranunculaceae). 

Actually, where you live makes a big difference to what you think a columbine looks like. In eastern North America, there is only one native columbine, Aquilegia canadensis. It has red sepals and spurs on the outside with yellow petals, stigmas and stamens inside. Click on the LINK !

The situation in Europe is similar. There is one common columbine, Aquilegia vulgaris. It has blue to purple sepals with white petals, stigma and stamens. Click on the LINK ! There are almost 20 rare columbine species in the mountains of Europe, but A. vulgaris is far the most widespread. In Latin, “vulgaris” means common, so the common European columbine is aptly named.

If you live in either of those areas, you are likely to have a particular image of columbine in your mind.