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(American Journal of Botany. 2009;96:1096-1107.) doi: 10.3732/ajb.0800102 © 2009 Botanical Society of America, Inc.

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Pollination ecology of the high latitude, dioecious cloudberry (Rubus chamaemorus; Rosaceae)¹

² Department of Biology, University of Ottawa, Ottawa, Ontario, K1N 6N5, Canada ³ Department of Biology, University of Western Ontario, London, N6A 5B7, Canada

ABSTRACT

In a 3-yr study, we examined the pollinator guild and intersexual floral characteristics of the dioecious, perennial cloudberry (Rubus chamaemorus), which flowers in early spring. The findings contribute to our general understanding of pollination ecology at high latitudes and provide important information for the commercialization of cloudberry. Female flowers were smaller than males but provided more nectar, although this resource was low in both sexes. Insects from 43 families visited cloudberry flowers, yet four families (Apidae, Halictidae, Muscidae, Syrphidae) represented ca. 87% of all visitors observed. Introduction experiments revealed that apids and muscids are significantly poorer pollinators (based on fruit production) than halictids and syrphids, but when fruit mass or seed set was considered, there were no significant differences between families. Pollinator importance, a product of flower visitation frequency and seed set effectiveness, revealed that the dipterans were of paramount importance to the pollination of cloudberry. Furthermore, they are limited to cloudberry because their lapping mouthparts exclude them from accessing the nutritional rewards of competing Ericaceae flowers. While the total number of pollinator families observed suggest a generalist pollination system, if one considers the dominant pollinators (flies) as a functional group, then this insect–flower relationship could be considered a specialized one.

Key Words: cloudberry • Diptera • functional groups • Hymenoptera • pollinator effectiveness • pollinator importance • Rosaceae • Rubus chamaemorus

Received for publication 20 March 2008. Accepted for publication 16 February 2009.

FOOTNOTES

¹ The authors thank L. Bordeleau, J. Beaulieu, and G. Wadhams for help in the field, and G. Daigle for help with statistical analyses. They especially thank L. Wadhams and R. Glinwood for analyses of flower volatiles and P. Kevan for UV analyses of flowers. Funding for this study was provided by scholarships from UL and NSERC to A.O.B. and grants from CORPAQ and NSERC to J.N.M. They also thank J. Brodeur, P. Kevan, J. Ollerton, and the anonymous reviewers for helpful comments on earlier drafts. This work was undertaken while both authors were at the Department of Biology, Laval University, Quebec City, Canada.

⁴ Author for correspondence (e-mail: abrown{at}uottawa.ca)

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