Floral temperature and optimal foraging: is heat a feasible floral reward for pollinators?
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ABSTRACT:
SUBMITTER: Rands SA
PROVIDER: S-EPMC2292243 | biostudies-literature | 2008 Apr
REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature
Publications
Floral temperature and optimal foraging: is heat a feasible floral reward for pollinators?
Rands Sean A SA Whitney Heather M HM
PloS one 20080423 4
As well as nutritional rewards, some plants also reward ectothermic pollinators with warmth. Bumble bees have some control over their temperature, but have been shown to forage at warmer flowers when given a choice, suggesting that there is some advantage to them of foraging at warm flowers (such as reducing the energy required to raise their body to flight temperature before leaving the flower). We describe a model that considers how a heat reward affects the foraging behaviour in a thermogenic ...[more]
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