Orchid fouls the pollinators with chemicals
May 29, 2008
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When tissues are damaged in plants they emit green-leaf volatiles which are attractive to social wasps. This happens because normally plants are damaged by parasites like caterpillars and wasps are their predator, so when a plant is damaged and emits those green leaf volatiles the parasitic wasps come to check it out to see if their meal is around.
Researchers have already found that orchids, which are known by the diversity of their pollination systems, also employ chemical deceit for the attraction of pollinators but this new way is just too awesome.
The orchid Epipactis helleborine is a typical wasp flower, exhibiting physiological and morphological adaptations for the attraction of pollinating social wasps. Despite the large nectar reward that these orchids offer, they’re overlooked by other potential pollinators because of their characteristics.
The wasps are attracted to those orchids because their flowers also emit green-leaf volatiles that trick the wasps to come to them, when the wasp reaches the designated orchids they just forget the motive why they are there and just take attention on the large nectar reward that the orchids offer.
This is the first example in which green-leaf volatiles have been implicated in chemical mimicry for the attraction of pollinating insects.
Font: Volume 18 Issue 10: May 19, 2008 of Biology online
