Intra-seasonal variation of Erysimum mediohispanicum flower visitors in Sierra Nevada (Spain)

Abstract

Valverde, J., Calatayud, J., Gómez, J.M., Perfectti, F. 2014. Intra-seasonal variation of Erysimum mediohispanicum flower visitors in Sierra Nevada (Spain). Ecosistemas 23(3): 83-92. Doi.: 10.7818/ECOS.2014.23-3.11

Plant-pollinator interactions have traditionally been a hot topic in ecology and evolutionary biology due to both the ecological services it offers and its complexity as a system. Plants generally show a high diversity of floral visitors, making generalism a more common condition than expected. Furthermore floral visitor community seems to have spatio-temporal fluctuations in diversity and composition. Those variations respond to plant intrinsic and extrinsic factors and can affect to evolutionary and ecological aspects of plant populations. Here we assess the temporal variation in the floral visitor assemblage of the generalist plant Erysimum mediohispanicum Polatschek (Brassicaceae). We set up two experimental plots homogenizing for spatial and microenvironmental conditions to ascertain only the temporal variations in the floral visitors assemblage. During the flowering season we did daily censuses of the floral visitors, determining them to morpho-species level and clumped them in 16 functional groups based on morphological and behavioral characteristics. We found a high diversity for the whole assemblage in both experimental plots with high temporal fluctuations during the flowering season. Our results suggest an important species turnover with high fluctuations in relative abundance for some functional groups, which may turn into important ecological and evolutionary consequences.