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Pollination syndromes ignored: importance of non-ornithophilous flowers to Neotropical savanna hummingbirds

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Abstract

Generalization prevails in flower–animal interactions, and although animal visitors are not equally effective pollinators, most interactions likely represent an important energy intake for the animal visitor. Hummingbirds are nectar-feeding specialists, and many tropical plants are specialized toward hummingbird-pollination. In spite of this, especially in dry and seasonal tropical habitats, hummingbirds may often rely on non-ornithophilous plants to meet their energy requirements. However, quantitative studies evaluating the relative importance of ornithophilous vs. non-ornithophilous plants for hummingbirds in these areas are scarce. We here studied the availability and use of floral resources by hummingbirds in two different areas of the Cerrado, the seasonal savannas in Central Brazil. Roughly half the hummingbird visited plant species were non-ornithophilous, and these contributed greatly to increase the overall nectar availability. We showed that mean nectar offer, at the transect scale, was the only parameter related to hummingbird visitation frequency, more so than nectar offer at single flowers and at the plant scale, or pollination syndrome. Centrality indices, calculated using hummingbird–plant networks, showed that ornithophilous and non-ornithophilous plants have similar importance for network cohesion. How this foraging behaviour affects reproduction of non-ornithophilous plants remains largely unexplored and is probably case specific, however, we suggest that the additional energy provided by non-ornithophilous plants may facilitate reproduction of truly ornithophilous flowers by attracting and maintaining hummingbirds in the area. This may promote asymmetric hummingbird–plant associations, i.e., pollination depends on floral traits adapted to hummingbird morphology, but hummingbird visitation is determined more by the energetic "reward" than by pollination syndromes.

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Acknowledgments

We thank Felipe W. Amorim, Francielle P. Araújo, Amanda F. Cunha, Leandro Freitas, and Jesper Sonne for comments on earlier versions of the manuscript. Further comments made by Nick Waser, Paul CaraDonna and two anonymous reviewers improved the quality of the manuscript. Financial support was provided by CNPq (Conselho Nacional de Desenvolvimento Científico e Tecnológico) and FAPEMIG (Fundação de Amparo à Pesquisa do Estado de Minas Gerais) in Brazil and the Carlsberg Foundation to B. Dalsgaard in Denmark. B. Dalsgaard also thank the Danish National Research Foundation for its support of the Center for Macroecology, Evolution and Climate. We state that this study complies with the current laws of Brazil. Finally, we thank all the members of Marlies Sazima's Lab at Unicamp, for inspiring many of the discussions presented here.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Instituto de Biologia, Universidade Federal de Uberlândia (UFU), Cx. Postal 593, CEP 38400-902, Uberlândia, MG, Brazil

    Pietro K. Maruyama, Carolina Ferreira & Paulo E. Oliveira

  2. Instituto Federal do Triângulo Mineiro, Campus Uberlândia. Fazenda Sobradinho, Zona Rural, Cx. Postal 592, CEP 38400-974, Uberlândia, MG, Brazil

    Genilda M. Oliveira

  3. Center for Macroecology, Evolution and Climate, Natural History Museum, University of Copenhagen, Universitetsparken 15, 2100, Copenhagen, Denmark

    Bo Dalsgaard

  4. Programa de Pós-Graduacão em Ecologia Instituto de Biologia, Universidade Estadual de Campinas (UNICAMP), Cx. Postal 6109, CEP 13083-862, Campinas, SP, Brazil

    Pietro K. Maruyama

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  1. Pietro K. Maruyama
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  2. Genilda M. Oliveira
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  3. Carolina Ferreira
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Correspondence to Pietro K. Maruyama.

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Communicated by: Beverley Glover

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Maruyama, P.K., Oliveira, G.M., Ferreira, C. et al. Pollination syndromes ignored: importance of non-ornithophilous flowers to Neotropical savanna hummingbirds. Naturwissenschaften 100, 1061–1068 (2013). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00114-013-1111-9

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s00114-013-1111-9

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