0000000000906011
AUTHOR
Marlies Sazima
The perfume flowers ofCyphomandra (Solanaceae): Pollination by euglossine bees, bellows mechanism, osmophores, and volatiles
The perfume syndrome and pollination by fragrance-collecting euglossine bees in the neotropic solanaceous genusCyphomandra was confirmed by field observations. In SE Brazil,C. sciadostylis was visited byEufriesea violaceae, andC. diploconos byEuglossa mandibularis; C. hartwegii was pollinated byEulaema meriana in Costa Rica. The primary attractant, fragrant droplets that ooze from the dorsally bulged connectives, is mopped up by the males with the forebasitarsi. Thereby, the poricidal thecae are inadvertently pushed causing the dry pollen to dust the bee's sternum. The number and direction of the pollen jets are related to pollinator size and stigma structure. The flowers are homogamous, se…
Bat pollination ofEncholirium glaziovii, a terrestrial bromeliad
The many-flowered, brush-like spikes ofEncholirium glaziovii, a ground-dwelling pitcairnioid bromeliad of the “campo rupestre” formation of southeastern Brazil, was observed being pollinated by the glossophagine bat,Lonchophylla bokermanni, in the Serra do Cipo (Minas Gerais). Nectar feeding was while hovering, and the pollen was preferentially transferred by the bat's snout. The floral pattern is chiropterophilous; unlike known tillandsioid bat flowers, stamens and style are protrusive beyond a small, persistent perigon, and anthesis, apparently protogynous, extends over several nights, with gradual onset and cease. Although various other flower-visitingChiroptera are known to occur in the…