ArticleAnnals of botany2019
Ant pollination of Paepalanthus lundii (Eriocaulaceae) in Brazilian savanna.
Article in Annals of botany, 2019. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 13 papers.
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Who cites it
13 citing papers in PubMed.
- Pollination and plant reproduction in the Cerrado, the world's most biodiverse savanna.Biological reviews of the Cambridge Philosophical Society · 2026Review
- Ants as Flower Visitors: Diversity and Network Structure Assessed for the First Time in the Atlantic Forest of Southern Brazil.Neotropical entomology · 2025Article
- Sequential Defense Strategies: From Ant Recruitment to Leaf Toughness.Plants (Basel, Switzerland) · 2024Article
- The Greasy Pole Syndrome inPlants (Basel, Switzerland) · 2024Article
- Emerging Trends in Ant-Pollinator Conflict in Extrafloral Nectary-Bearing Plants.Plants (Basel, Switzerland) · 2024Review
- Bacterial diversity in arboreal ant nesting spaces is linked to colony developmental stage.Communications biology · 2023Article
- Ants are more than just curious bystanders to some flowers-they act as significant pollinators.Frontiers in insect science · 2023Review
- Mixed pollination system and floral signals of Paepalanthus (Eriocaulaceae): insects and geitonogamy ensure high reproductive success.Annals of botany · 2022Article
- Native and invasive ants affect floral visits of pollinating honey bees in pumpkin flowers (Cucurbita maxima).Scientific reports · 2021Article
- Distance Dependent Contribution of Ants to Pollination but Not Defense in a Dioecious, Ambophilous Gymnosperm.Frontiers in plant science · 2021Article
- Pollen adaptation to ant pollination: a case study from the Proteaceae.Annals of botany · 2020Article
- In search of unusual interactions. A commentary on: 'Pollen adaptation to ant pollination: a case study from the Proteaceae'.Annals of botany · 2020Article
- Neither ant dominance nor abundance explain ant-plant network structure in Mexican temperate forests.PeerJ · 2020Article
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Authors and funding
5 authors.
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Abstract
BACKGROUND AND
aimsAnt-plant associations are widely diverse and distributed throughout the world, leading to complex ecological networks. Regarding ant-plant mutualism, ant pollination is a very rare interaction and few studies have shown the role of ants as pollinators. Therefore, we aimed to evaluate the role of ants as effective pollinators of Paepalanthus lundii (Eriocaulaceae) in a Brazilian savanna.
methodsFieldwork with experimental manipulation was conducted to evaluate the fitness of P. lundii, considering potential pollinators. For this, we mainly observed the number of seeds produced in different conditions: control, ant exclusion, exclusion of flying insects, and exclusion (entomophily test) of both ants and flying insects. Furthermore, we evaluated all floral visitors throughout the day, stigma receptivity, the numbers of male and female flowers, and patterns of species co-occurrence, which can indicate the presence of different pollinators in the plants at the same time. KEY
resultsWe observed a relation between seed production and ant visits; Camponotus crassus was the most frequent floral visitor and the most effective pollinator. Also, we observed a statistical difference between the numbers of male and female flowers produced, with a greater number of male flowers. Furthermore, P. lundii presented flowering asynchrony, with 12 different types of maturation sequence, which indicates a cross-pollination system. Lastly, we observed an overlap of the greatest abundance of C. crassus and the time of plant stigmatic receptivity, and a pattern of non co-occurrence of ants, which shows the pollinator role of this ant.
conclusionsOur data provide evidence that previous generalizations neglecting the importance of ants as pollinators are wrong. Brazilian savanna can reveal a lot about the ant-pollination syndrome, since this environment presents peculiar characteristics related to this association. Thus, this study has great significance for the understanding of the ant-pollination syndrome, and for the understanding of the complex ecological networks present in these dry arid systems.
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