Sajjad Asif, Liu Junhe, Wang Yusha, Farooqi Muhammad Aslam, Zhao Zihua, Ahmad Ammad, Akram Waseem, Ali Mudssar, Ali Abid
Department of Entomology, Faculty of Agriculture and Environment, The Islamia University of Bahawalpur, Bahawalpur, Pakistan.
College of Biological and Food Engineering, Huanghuai University, Zhumadian, Henan, China.
PLoS One. 2021 Feb 19;16(2):e0247124. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0247124. eCollection 2021.
Assessment of resource partitioning in pollinators at a particular place can be used to conserve plant communities by minimizing their inter-specific competition. Current study was conducted to investigate the occurrence of this phenomenon among plant communities under sub-tropical conditions for the first time in Pakistan. We considered the entire available flowering plant and floral visitor communities in the study area-Lal Suhanra forest of Bahawalpur, Pakistan- along with different variations among them based on morphology, color and symmetry (functional groups) i.e. four functional groups among insects and nine among plants. Weekly floral visitor censuses were conducted during spring season -from the first week of March to the fourth week of May 2018. Thirty individuals of each plant species -in bloom- were observed for floral visitors in each census. Plant species with different floral shapes, colors and symmetry did not show any significant resource partitioning. The Non-metric multidimensional scaling analysis followed by one-way ANOSIM test showed non- significant differences among all the pair of floral shapes, colors (except white and yellow) and symmetry (R-value < 0.168). However, SIMPER test suggested that flies were the most common group that contributed more towards within group similarities of different floral shapes (19 to 21% similarity), colors (16 to 30%) and symmetry (19%) followed by long-tongue bees i.e. 14 to 21%, 9 to 19% and 18%, respectively. Our results suggest that plant communities under sub-tropical conditions of Pakistan exhibit a generalist pollination system with no significant resource partitioning in pollinator species. Therefore, plant communities may have high competition for pollinator species which exhibits fewer implications of species loss on overall pollination process. Our study provides the basis for understanding the partitioning of pollinator guilds under sub-tropical conditions. Future studies should focus on functional traits in more detail at the community and the population scales for their possible impact on resource partitioning.
评估特定地点传粉者的资源分配情况，可通过减少种间竞争来保护植物群落。本研究首次在巴基斯坦的亚热带条件下，调查了植物群落中这一现象的发生情况。我们考虑了研究区域——巴基斯坦巴哈瓦尔布尔的拉尔苏汉拉森林中所有可用的开花植物和访花者群落，以及它们基于形态、颜色和对称性（功能组）的不同变化，即昆虫中有四个功能组，植物中有九个功能组。在2018年春季（从3月的第一周至5月的第四周）进行了每周一次的访花者普查。每次普查中，观察了每种开花植物的30个个体上的访花者。具有不同花形、颜色和对称性的植物物种未表现出任何显著的资源分配。非度量多维尺度分析随后进行的单向ANOSIM检验表明，所有花形、颜色（白色和黄色除外）和对称性的配对之间均无显著差异（R值<0.168）。然而，SIMPER检验表明，苍蝇是最常见的群体，对不同花形（相似度为19%至21%）、颜色（16%至30%）和对称性（19%）的组内相似度贡献更大，其次是长舌蜂，分别为14%至21%、9%至19%和18%。我们的结果表明，巴基斯坦亚热带条件下的植物群落表现出一种泛化传粉系统，传粉者物种中没有显著的资源分配。因此，植物群落可能对传粉者物种存在高度竞争，这对整个传粉过程中物种损失的影响较小。我们的研究为理解亚热带条件下传粉者 guilds 的分配提供了基础。未来的研究应更详细地关注群落和种群尺度上的功能性状对资源分配的可能影响。
