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Diurnal and nocturnal pollination of Silene alba (Caryophyllaceae)¹

Middlebury College, Biology Department, Middlebury, Vermont 05753 USA

Flowers that are open for >12 h may be visited by both diurnal and nocturnal pollinators. I compared the effectiveness (measured as seed production and pollen movement distance) of diurnal and nocturnal pollinators of Silene alba, a species whose flowers open in evening but close by midmorning the following day. By bagging flowers either during evening hours or during daylight hours or both day and night, I compared seed production caused by diurnal and nocturnal pollinators. Flowers exposed only to nocturnal visitors (mostly sphingid and noctuid moths) produced significantly more seeds than flowers exposed only to diurnal visitors (bees, flies, and wasps). Fluorescent dye applied to anthers moved significantly further and to more stigmas at night than during the day. In both measures of pollination effectiveness, nocturnal-visiting moths are better pollinators of S. alba than are the diurnal-visiting bees, flies, and wasps. These data support the hypothesis that floral phenology is an adaptation to expose flowers to the most effective pollinators.

Key Words: Autographa californica • Caryophyllaceae • Hadena variolata • Hyles gallii • Leucania multilinea • moth pollination • nocturnal pollination • Silene alba • Silene latifolia

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