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© 2022 by the authors. Licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland. This article is an open access article distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) license (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/). Notwithstanding the ProQuest Terms and Conditions, you may use this content in accordance with the terms of the License.

Abstract

Co-flowering plants can experience an array of interactions, ranging from facilitation to competition, the direction and strength of which are often dependent on the relative abundance and diversity of the plant species involved and the foraging behavior of their pollinators. Understanding interactions between plant–pollinator networks and how they change over time is particularly important within agricultural systems, such as apples, that flower en masse and that also contain non-crop co-flowering species both within the farm and the surrounding landscape. We determined the degree of overlap between pollinator networks on two varieties of apple (Granny Smith and Pink Lady) and co-flowering plant species within orchards and the wider vegetation matrix in two apple-growing regions (Orange and Bilpin) in Australia. We surveyed plant–pollinator interactions at key stages of the cropping cycle: before mass flowering; during king, peak and late blooms; and, finally, once apple flowering had finished. Overall, we found considerable overlap in the flower visitor assemblage on apples and co-flowering species within the orchard. The introduced honeybee (Apis mellifera) was the most frequent flower visitor to all three vegetation types at all times in Orange. However, in Bilpin, both a native stingless bee (Tetragonula carbonaria) and A. mellifera were highly frequent visitors, both on- and off-crop. Numerous native bees, flies and Lepidoptera also commonly visited apple and co-flowering species within orchards in both locations. We found that native-bee and honeybee visitation to apple flowers was positively correlated with co-flowering species richness (within the orchard and the wider matrix); however, visitation by native bees decreased as the area of co-flowering species in the surrounding landscape increased. Our study highlights the importance of maintaining diverse co-flowering plant communities within the local landscape to increase and support a wide variety of pollinators in horticultural production systems.

Details

Title
Co-Flowering Species Richness Increases Pollinator Visitation to Apple Flowers
Author
Amy-Marie Gilpin 1   VIAFID ORCID Logo  ; Kobel, Conrad 2 ; Brettell, Laura E 3   VIAFID ORCID Logo  ; Corey O’Brien 1 ; Cook, James M 1 ; Power, Sally A 1 

 Hawkesbury Institute for the Environment, Western Sydney University, Locked Bag 1797, Penrith, NSW 2751, Australia 
 Australian Health Services Research Institute, University of Wollongong, Wollongong, NSW 2522, Australia 
 Hawkesbury Institute for the Environment, Western Sydney University, Locked Bag 1797, Penrith, NSW 2751, Australia; Department of Vector Biology, Liverpool School of Tropical Medicine, Liverpool L3 5QA, UK 
First page
1246
Publication year
2022
Publication date
2022
Publisher
MDPI AG
e-ISSN
20770472
Source type
Scholarly Journal
Language of publication
English
ProQuest document ID
2706056390
Copyright
© 2022 by the authors. Licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland. This article is an open access article distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) license (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/). Notwithstanding the ProQuest Terms and Conditions, you may use this content in accordance with the terms of the License.