Innate colour preferences of the Australian native stingless bee Tetragonula carbonaria Sm.

Dyer, Adrian G.; Boyd-Gerny, Skye; Shrestha, Mani; Lunau, Klaus; Garcia, Jair E.; Köthe, Sebastian; Wong, Bob B. M.

doi:10.1007/s00359-016-1101-4

Cited by 57 publications

(70 citation statements)

References 88 publications

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“…Further studies are underway to test for the effect of abiotic environmental stresses, such as evapotranspiration and resource limitation For I. pumila, the role of pollinators, particularly bumblebees, appeared to be more ambiguous since we detected a stabilizing selection mediated by pollinator's choice for the blue morph only. Some studies have reported that bumblebees have an innate colour preference for the blue range of wavelengths (Lunau andMaier 1995, Smithson andMacnair 1996), a pattern observed in other bees species (Dyer et al 2016). Such innate colour bias is expected to guide them to explore blue flowers in preference to other natural objects within a landscape.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 96%

Are pollinators the agents of selection on flower colour and size in irises?

Souto‐Vilarós

Vuleta

Jovanović

et al. 2018

Oikos

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Plant–pollinator interactions are believed to play a major role in the evolution of floral traits. Flower colour and flower size are important for attracting pollinators, directly influencing reproduction, and thus expected to be under pollinator‐mediated selection. Pollinator‐mediated selection is also proposed to play a role in maintaining flower colour polymorphism within populations. However, pigment concentrations, and thus flower colour, are also under selective pressures independent of pollinators. We quantified phenotypic pollinator‐mediated selection on flower colour and size in two colour polymorphic Iris species. Using female fitness, we estimated phenotypic selection on flower colour and size, and tested for pollinator‐mediated selection by comparing selection gradients between flowers open to natural pollination and supplementary pollinated flowers. In both species, we found evidence for pollen limitation, which set the base for pollinator‐mediated selection. In the colour dimorphic Iris lutescens, while pigment concentration and flower size were found to be under selection, this was independent of pollinators. For the polymorphic Iris pumila, pigment concentration is under selective pressure by pollinators, but only for one colour morph. Our results suggest that pollinators are not the main agents of selection on floral traits in these irises, as opposed to the accepted paradigm on floral evolution. This study provides an opposing example to the largely‐accepted theory that pollinators are the major agent of selection on floral traits.

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Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 96%

Are pollinators the agents of selection on flower colour and size in irises?

Souto‐Vilarós

Vuleta

Jovanović

et al. 2018

Oikos

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“…Marker points of bee‐ and hummingbird‐flowers were frequently closer to the wavelengths of maximal spectral discrimination of their main pollinators, similar to previous studies (Dyer et al ., ; Shrestha et al ., ). Hummingbird‐flowers reflected more and presented more marker points at long wavelengths (red band), whereas bee‐flowers reflected and presented more marker points at short and medium wavelengths (UV and blue bands) in accordance with bees’ visual sensitivity and colour preferences (Chittka et al ., ; Dyer et al ., ). We also found that marker points of bee‐flowers were significantly closer to the optimal wavelength for colour discrimination in bees, mainly at 400 nm, confirming that colours of bee‐flowers are better discriminated by bees than are colours of hummingbird‐flowers.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 97%

“…We surveyed categorical and quantitative variables previously described as important visual signals for target detection and discrimination by bees and birds (Spaethe et al, 2001;Cazetta et al, 2009;Dyer et al, 2016;Bukovac et al, 2017;van der Kooi et al, 2018). We considered as categorical variables the presence of colour patterns, floral guides and UV patterns ( Fig.…”

Section: Colour Variablesmentioning

confidence: 99%

How flower colour signals allure bees and hummingbirds: a community‐level test of the bee avoidance hypothesis

Camargo¹,

Lunau

Batalha

et al. 2018

New Phytologist

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Summary Colour signals are the main floral trait for plant–pollinator communication. Owing to visual specificities, flower visitors exert different selective pressures on flower colour signals of plant communities. Although they evolved to attract pollinators, matching their visual sensitivity and colour preferences, floral signals may also evolve to avoid less efficient pollinators and antagonistic flower visitors. We evaluated evidence for the bee avoidance hypothesis in a Neotropical community pollinated mainly by bees and hummingbirds, the campo rupestre. We analysed flower reflectance spectra, compared colour variables of bee‐pollinated flowers (bee‐flowers; 244 species) and hummingbird‐pollinated flowers (hummingbird‐flowers; 39 species), and looked for evidence of bee sensorial exclusion in hummingbird‐flowers. Flowers were equally contrasting for hummingbirds. Hummingbird‐flowers were less conspicuous to bees, reflecting mainly long wavelengths and avoiding red‐blind visitors. Bee‐flowers reflected more short wavelengths, were more conspicuous to bees (higher contrasts and spectral purity) than hummingbird‐flowers and displayed floral guides more frequently, favouring flower attractiveness, discrimination and handling by bees. Along with no phylogenetic signal, the differences in colour signal strategies between bee‐ and hummingbird‐flowers are the first evidence of the bee avoidance hypothesis at a community level and reinforce the role of pollinators as a selective pressure driving flower colour diversity.

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“…Several studies have described spontaneous colour preferences in bees (Lunau 1990;Giurfa et al 1995;Chittka et al 2004;Dyer et al 2016), butterflies (Ilse 1928;Swihart and Swihart 1970;Weiss 1997;Kinoshita et al 1999;Kandori et al 2009;Blackiston et al 2011), moths (Kelber 1996;Goyret et al 2008), and hoverflies (Lunau and Wacht 1994). The aims of the present study were to explore a comparative approach with bees and to identify potential differences in spontaneous colour responses between temperate and tropical bees, comparing the responses of three social bee species that were tested under the same conditions.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Facial patterns in a tropical social wasp correlate with colony membership

Baracchi

Turillazzi

Chittka

2016

Sci Nat

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The spontaneous occurrence of colour preferences without learning has been demonstrated in several insect species; however, the underlying mechanisms are still not understood. Here, we use a comparative approach to investigate spontaneous and learned colour preferences in foraging bees of two tropical and one temperate species. We hypothesised that tropical bees utilise different sets of plants and therefore might differ in their spontaneous colour preferences. We tested colour-naive bees and foragers from colonies that had been enclosed in large flight cages for a long time. Bees were shortly trained with triplets of neutral, UV-grey stimuli placed randomly at eight locations on a black training disk to induce foraging motivation. During unrewarded tests, the bees' responses to eight colours were video-recorded. Bees explored all colours and displayed an overall preference for colours dominated by long or short wavelengths, rather than a single colour stimulus. Naive Apis cerana and Bombus terrestris showed similar choices. Both inspected long-wavelength stimuli more than short-wavelength stimuli, whilst responses of the tropical stingless bee Tetragonula iridipennis differed, suggesting that resource partitioning could be a determinant of spontaneous colour preferences. Reward on an unsaturated yellow colour shifted the bees' preference curves as predicted, which is in line with previous findings that brief colour experience overrides the expression of spontaneous preferences. We conclude that rather than determining foraging behaviour in inflexible ways, spontaneous colour preferences vary depending on experimental settings and reflect potential biases in mechanisms of learning and decision-making in pollinating insects.

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Innate colour preferences of the Australian native stingless bee Tetragonula carbonaria Sm.

Cited by 57 publications

References 88 publications

Are pollinators the agents of selection on flower colour and size in irises?

Are pollinators the agents of selection on flower colour and size in irises?

How flower colour signals allure bees and hummingbirds: a community‐level test of the bee avoidance hypothesis

Facial patterns in a tropical social wasp correlate with colony membership

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