RUI: Reciprocal, Direct and Indirect Effects of Pre-dispersal Seed Predation and Pollination of Two Co-occurring Plants

本研究探讨了传粉者和种子捕食者在两种落基山野花：Polemonium foliosissimum和Ipomopsis aggregata开花时间起源中的联合作用。由于这两种植物有共同的种子捕食者，但利用不同的传粉者，因此一种植物的开花时间可能通过吸引种子捕食者而影响另一种植物的种子产量。研究人员还在研究种子捕食者（一种花蝇）是如何选择和/或操纵花朵来提高自己后代的存活率的。这项研究在解决两种共享种子捕食者的植物之间潜在的间接相互作用方面是新颖的。以前的大多数研究都局限于一次研究生物之间的单一相互作用。这个项目很重要，因为它同时解决了多种植物-植物和植物-昆虫的相互作用，允许检测复杂的关系，这些关系可能在自然界中很常见，但通常在标准的生态学研究中被忽视。这项研究的结果可能在农业和保护生物学中有应用：有价值的植物的种子产量往往同时被种子捕食者减少而被传粉者增加。了解这些冲突的动态可能有助于我们了解如何优化开花时间表以提高种子产量。＊＊＊

9318602 Brody This research investigates the combined roles of pollinators and a seed predator on the origins of flowering times of two Rocky Mountain wildflowers: Polemonium foliosissimum and Ipomopsis aggregata. Because these two plant species have a common seed predator but utilize different pollinators, the flowering time of one species may affect seed production in the other by attracting the seed predator. The investigators are also examining how the seed predators (an anthomyiid fly) select and/or manipulate flowers to increase their own offspring's survival. %%% This research is novel in addressing the potential indirect interaction between two plants species that share seed predators. Most previous research has been limited to studying a single interaction between organisms at a time. This project is important in that it addresses multiple plant-plant and plant-insect interactions simultaneously, allowing the detection of complex relationships that may be common in nature but usually ignored in standard ecological studies. The results of this research may have applications in agriculture and conservation biology: seed-production by valuable plants is often simultaneously reduced by seed predators and increased by pollinators. Understanding the dynamics of these conflicts may help us learn how to optimize flowering schedules to increase seed yields. ***