Evidence of widespread pollination-mediated facilitation in South Andean plant communities based on pollen transfer networks

AIZEN MARCELO; TUR CRISTINA; AGUSTÍN SÁEZ; TRAVESET ANA

Punta Arenas

Simposio; VIII Southern Connection Congress; 2016

Information about the relative importance of competitive or facilitative pollinator-mediated interactions in a multi-species context is limited. We studied interspecific pollen transfer (IPT) networks to evaluate quantity and quality effects of pollinator sharing among plant species on three high-Andean communities at 1600, 1800 and 2000 m a.s.l. To estimate the sign of the effects (positive, neutral or negative), the relation between conspecific and heterospecific pollen deposited on stigmas was analysed with GLMMs. Network analyses showed that communities were characterised by the presence of pollen hub-donors and receptors. We inferred that facilitative and neutralpollinator-mediated interactions among plants prevailed over competition. Thus, the benefits from pollinator sharing seem to outweigh the costs (i.e. heterospecific deposition and conspecific pollen loss). The largest proportion of facilitated species was found at the highest elevation community,suggesting that under unfavourable conditions for the pollination service and at lower plant densities facilitation can be more common.