Where have all the blue flowers gone: Pollinator responses and selection on flower colour in New Zealand Wahlenbergia albomarginata

D. R. Campbell, M. Bischoff, J. M. Lord, A. W. Robertson

Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

28 Citations (Scopus)

Abstract

Although pollinators are thought to select on flower colour, few studies have experimentally decoupled effects of colour from correlated traits on pollinator visitation and pollen transfer. We combined selection analysis and phenotypic manipulations to measure the effect of petal colour on visitation and pollen export at two spatial scales in Wahlenbergia albomarginata. This species is representative of many New Zealand alpine herbs that have secondarily evolved white or pale flowers. The major pollinators, solitary bees, exerted phenotypic selection on flower size but not colour, quantified by bee vision. When presented with manipulated flowers, bees visited flowers painted blue to resemble a congener over white flowers in large, but not small, experimental arrays. Pollen export was higher for blue flowers in large arrays. Pollinator preference does not explain the pale colouration of W. albomarginata, as commonly hypothesized. Absence of bright blue could be driven instead by indirect selection of correlated characters.

Original languageEnglish
Pages (from-to)352-364
Number of pages13
JournalJournal of Evolutionary Biology
Volume25
Issue number2
DOIs
Publication statusPublished - 1 Feb 2012

Keywords

  • Flower colour
  • Male fitness
  • Phenotypic manipulation
  • Phenotypic selection
  • Pollination
  • Solitary bee
  • Spatial scale
  • Wahlenbergia albomarginata

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