Sharing of Pollinators Between Plants In An Ohio
Wetland
Marcel N. Nwizu, Dr. Randall J. Mitchell. The University of Akron
Is the time of day a factor in which
species of flower was visited?
Does the size of the bees visiting
Mimulus differ from the size of the bees
visiting Verbena?
Do these bees move between Mimulus
and Verbena flowers?
Time Slot Vs. # of Bee Visits (Normalized)
0.7
0.5
Mimulus
Vervain
Impatiens
Mixed
0.4
0.3
0.2
0.1
0
8
9
10
11
Time ofDay (Am-Noon)
12
Fig. 1 illustrates the number of bee
sightings for a species of flower at
a certain time of day.
Are Bees on Mimulus Larger?
3.5
3.4
3.3
3.2
3.1
3
2.9
2.8
2.7
Mimulus
Verbena
Flower Species
Fig.2 represents the average head
width of bees on Mimulus and bees on
Verbena. The difference is significant
with a p-value of 0.048.
Bees were tagged to keep track of what
plant species they visited and to calculate
head width.
800
700
600
500
400
300
200
100
0
MR 108
4
9
3
2
0
VH
Mimulus
Verbena
IC
Impatiens
5 0 24
IC
Fig. 3 (left) illustrates the number of
intraspecies moves bees make. Fig. 4 (right)
shows the number of interspecies moves bees
make. MR represents Mimulus ringens, VH
represents Verbena hastata, and IC for
Impatiens capensis.
Flowers Species
CONCLUSION:
0.6
Bee Head Width (mm)
Do the species of bees differ between
Mimulus and Verbena?
RESULTS:
Number of Bee Visits
Plants that share pollinators
may compete with one another for the services
of pollinators. I studied this process for two
plant species: Mimulus ringens (monkeyflower), and Verbena hastata (Vervain) at
Panzner Wetland (Copley Ohio). I found
correlations between bee activity on each
species versus the time of day and bee size
versus species visited. The bees appeared to
work in shifts, with different bees in each shift.
These data suggest that there is very little
sharing of pollinators between these two
species of flowers.
Number of Intraspecies
Moves
ABSTRACT:
MR VH
Do Bees Move Between
Species?
Bees on both flowers were predominantly B.
impatiens (91%). Bees on Mimulus flower tend
to only visit that species of flower, while bees on
Verbena flower tend to only visit that species of
flower. There was only a very small amount of
interspecies moves (9% interspecies moves).
Bees usually do not move between the two
species of flowers. Mimulus is predominately
visited in the early morning, and Verbena is
mostly visited late morning to noon. Also, large
bees visit the Mimulus flower, and small bees
visit the Verbena flower.
Discussions:
A possible reason for
Mimulus and Verbena not sharing
pollinators is larger bees may receive a
greater pollen or nectar reward from visiting
the larger Mimulus flower, while smaller
bees are only able to handle the amount of
pollen or nectar in the smaller Verbena
flower. Another reason may be that larger
bees are able to handle the colder
temperatures of the morning so Mimulus is
predominately visited in the morning. When
it warms up smaller bees come out and
start to visit the Verbena flower.