scholarly journals First report of predation on floral visitors by crab spiders on Croton selowii Baill. (Euphorbiaceae)

2010 ◽  
Vol 24 (2) ◽  
pp. 592-594 ◽  
Author(s):  
Reinaldo Rodrigo Novo ◽  
Jefferson Thiago Souza ◽  
Cibele Cardoso de Castro

In the literature it has been extensively mentioned that crab spiders (Araneae: Thomisidae) prey on floral visitors of several plant species. Here we present observations of Croton selowii Baill. (Euphorbiaceae), a monoecious species harboring individuals of crab spiders in an area of coastal vegetation of Pernambuco state, Brazil. The species is visited by several invertebrate orders, and some of them were preyed upon by the spiders, mainly Diptera species. The spiders rubbed the forelimbs within the flowers, which may constitute a strategy to camouflage these structures. Croton selowii seems to represent a suitable foraging site for the spiders, because it has a generalist pollination system (thus being visited by a wide range of invertebrate species) and blooms in a period of low flower resource availability in the area.

2015 ◽  
Vol 87 (4) ◽  
pp. 2163-2175 ◽  
Author(s):  
LORENA C.N. FONSECA ◽  
JEFERSON VIZENTIN-BUGONI ◽  
ANDRÉ R. RECH ◽  
MARIA ALICE S. ALVES

ABSTRACT Hummingbirds are the most important and specialized group of pollinating birds in the Neotropics and their interactions with plants are key components to many communities. In the present study we identified the assemblage of plants visited by hummingbirds and investigated the temporal availability of floral resources in an area of restinga, sandy plain coastal vegetation associated with the Atlantic forest, in Southeastern Brazil. We recorded flower and nectar features, flowering phenology and interactions between plants and hummingbirds and estimated the amount of calories produced per hectare from June 2005 to August 2006. Ten plant species were visited by two hummingbirds,Amazilia fimbriata and Eupetomena macroura. Resource availability was highly variable among plant species and over time. Nectar volume and concentration per flower were similar to other Neotropical hummingbird-visited plant assemblages. The estimated nectar resource availability between months varied from 0.85 to 5.97 Kcal per hectare/day, demanding an area between one and 6.8 ha to support a single hummingbird. Our study reports an unusual tropical setting where almost all interactions between hummingbirds and plants were performed by a single hummingbird species,A. fimbriata. Hence, the variable nectar availability is probably influencing hummingbird movements, its foraging area, and consequently plant pollination.


2011 ◽  
Vol 71 (2) ◽  
pp. 359-364 ◽  
Author(s):  
LC Rocha-Filho ◽  
IMP Rinaldi

Although crab spiders are common in flowering plants, their relations with plant species and its floral traits have been poorly known in the Neotropics. Observations regarding plant habits, floral visitors and also floral characteristics such as anthesis, odour, shape, colour and floral resources were recorded in flowering plant species of an area of "Cerrado" on a 2 km long trail. Misumenops argenteus and Misumenops pallens accounted for 62.86% of the spiders captured on 22 flowering plant species. The plants Senna rugosa (Fabaceae), Styrax ferrugineus (Styracaceae) and Banisteriopsis campestris (Malpighiaceae), hosted, each one, about 10 to 17% of the total spiders collected and these plants had diurnal anthesis, bee-attractive flower colours such as yellow (S. rugosa), white (S. ferrugineus), and pink (B. campestris), poricidal anthers as well as being visited by bees which evidenced bee-pollination syndrome. This study is the first survey regarding crab spiders and their associations with plant species of the "Cerrado".


Author(s):  
Cristián Raziel Delgado-González ◽  
Alfredo Madariaga-Navarrete ◽  
José Miguel Fernández-Cortés ◽  
Margarita Islas-Pelcastre ◽  
Goldie Oza ◽  
...  

Potable and good-quality drinking water availability is a serious global concern, since several pollution sources significantly contribute to low water quality. Amongst these pollution sources, several are releasing an array of hazardous agents into various environmental and water matrices. Unfortunately, there are not very many ecologically friendly systems available to treat the contaminated environment exclusively. Consequently, heavy metal water contamination leads to many diseases in humans, such as cardiopulmonary diseases and cytotoxicity, among others. To solve this problem, there are a plethora of emerging technologies that play an important role in defining treatment strategies. Phytoremediation, the usage of plants to remove contaminants, is a technology that has been widely used to remediate pollution in soils, with particular reference to toxic elements. Thus, hydroponic systems coupled with bioremediation for the removal of water contaminants have shown great relevance. In this review, we addressed several studies that support the development of phytoremediation systems in water. We cover the importance of applied science and environmental engineering to generate sustainable strategies to improve water quality. In this context, the phytoremediation capabilities of different plant species and possible obstacles that phytoremediation systems may encounter are discussed with suitable examples by comparing different mechanistic processes. According to the presented data, there are a wide range of plant species with water phytoremediation potential that need to be studied from a multidisciplinary perspective to make water phytoremediation a viable method.


2021 ◽  
Vol 11 (4) ◽  
pp. 1769
Author(s):  
María Noelia Jiménez ◽  
Gianluigi Bacchetta ◽  
Francisco Bruno Navarro ◽  
Mauro Casti ◽  
Emilia Fernández-Ondoño

The use of plant species to stabilize and accumulate trace elements in contaminated soils is considered of great usefulness given the difficulty of decontaminating large areas subjected to mining for long periods. In this work, the bioaccumulation of trace elements is studied by relating the concentrations in leaves and roots of three plants of Mediterranean distribution (Dittrichia viscosa, Cistus salviifolius, Euphorbia pithyusa subsp. cupanii) with the concentrations of trace elements in contaminated and uncontaminated soils. Furthermore, in the case of D. viscosa, to know the concentration of each element by biomass, the pool of trace elements was determined both in the aerial part and in the roots. The bioaccumulation factor was not high enough in any of the species studied to be considered as phytoextractors. However, species like the ones studied in this work that live on soils with a wide range of concentration of trace elements and that develop a considerable biomass could be considered for stabilization of contaminated soils. The plant species studied in this work are good candidates for gentle-remediation options in the polluted Mediterranean.


Oecologia ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 195 (1) ◽  
pp. 213-223
Author(s):  
Mark A. Lee ◽  
Grace Burger ◽  
Emma R. Green ◽  
Pepijn W. Kooij

AbstractPlant and animal community composition changes at higher elevations on mountains. Plant and animal species richness generally declines with elevation, but the shape of the relationship differs between taxa. There are several proposed mechanisms, including the productivity hypotheses; that declines in available plant biomass confers fewer resources to consumers, thus supporting fewer species. We investigated resource availability as we ascended three aspects of Helvellyn mountain, UK, measuring several plant nutritive metrics, plant species richness and biomass. We observed a linear decline in plant species richness as we ascended the mountain but there was a unimodal relationship between plant biomass and elevation. Generally, the highest biomass values at mid-elevations were associated with the lowest nutritive values, except mineral contents which declined with elevation. Intra-specific and inter-specific increases in nutritive values nearer the top and bottom of the mountain indicated that physiological, phenological and compositional mechanisms may have played a role. The shape of the relationship between resource availability and elevation was different depending on the metric. Many consumers actively select or avoid plants based on their nutritive values and the abundances of consumer taxa vary in their relationships with elevation. Consideration of multiple nutritive metrics and of the nutritional requirements of the consumer may provide a greater understanding of changes to plant and animal communities at higher elevations. We propose a novel hypothesis for explaining elevational diversity gradients, which warrants further study; the ‘nutritional complexity hypothesis’, where consumer species coexist due to greater variation in the nutritional chemistry of plants.


2019 ◽  
Vol 377 (6) ◽  
Author(s):  
Samson Afewerki ◽  
Armando Córdova

AbstractThe concept of merging enamine activation catalysis with transition metal catalysis is an important strategy, which allows for selective chemical transformations not accessible without this combination. The amine catalyst activates the carbonyl compounds through the formation of a reactive nucleophilic enamine intermediate and, in parallel, the transition metal activates a wide range of functionalities such as allylic substrates through the formation of reactive electrophilic π-allyl-metal complex. Since the first report of this strategy in 2006, considerable effort has been devoted to the successful advancement of this technology. In this chapter, these findings are highlighted and discussed.


2011 ◽  
Vol 12 (1) ◽  
pp. 34 ◽  
Author(s):  
Craig G. Webster ◽  
William W. Turechek ◽  
H. Charles Mellinger ◽  
Galen Frantz ◽  
Nancy Roe ◽  
...  

To the best of our knowledge, this is the first report of GRSV infecting tomatillo and eggplant, and it is the first report of GRSV infecting pepper in the United States. This first identification of GRSV-infected crop plants in commercial fields in Palm Beach and Manatee Counties demonstrates the continuing geographic spread of the virus into additional vegetable production areas of Florida. This information indicates that a wide range of solanaceous plants is likely to be infected by this emerging viral pathogen in Florida and beyond. Accepted for publication 27 June 2011. Published 25 July 2011.


Author(s):  
Qing-Mao Zeng ◽  
Tong-Lin Zhu ◽  
Xue-Ying Zhuang ◽  
Ming-Xuan Zheng

Leaf is one of the most important organs of plant. Leaf contour or outline, usually a closed curve, is a fundamental morphological feature of leaf in botanical research. In this paper, a novel shape descriptor based on periodic wavelet series and leaf contour is presented, which we name as Periodic Wavelet Descriptor (PWD). The PWD of a leaf actually expresses the leaf contour in a vector form. Consequently, the PWD of a leaf has a wide range in practical applications, such as leaf modeling, plant species identification and classification, etc. In this work, the plant species identification and the leaf contour reconstruction, as two practical applications, are discussed to elaborate how to employ the PWD of a plant leaf in botanical research.


2009 ◽  
Vol 39 (2) ◽  
pp. 231-248 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jeffrey S. Dukes ◽  
Jennifer Pontius ◽  
David Orwig ◽  
Jeffrey R. Garnas ◽  
Vikki L. Rodgers ◽  
...  

Climate models project that by 2100, the northeastern US and eastern Canada will warm by approximately 3–5 °C, with increased winter precipitation. These changes will affect trees directly and also indirectly through effects on “nuisance” species, such as insect pests, pathogens, and invasive plants. We review how basic ecological principles can be used to predict nuisance species’ responses to climate change and how this is likely to impact northeastern forests. We then examine in detail the potential responses of two pest species (hemlock woolly adelgid ( Adelges tsugae Annand) and forest tent caterpillar ( Malacosoma disstria Hubner)), two pathogens (armillaria root rot ( Armillaria spp.) and beech bark disease ( Cryptococcus fagisuga Lind. + Neonectria spp.)), and two invasive plant species (glossy buckthorn ( Frangula alnus Mill.) and oriental bittersweet ( Celastrus orbiculatus Thunb.)). Several of these species are likely to have stronger or more widespread effects on forest composition and structure under the projected climate. However, uncertainty pervades our predictions because we lack adequate data on the species and because some species depend on complex, incompletely understood, unstable relationships. While targeted research will increase our confidence in making predictions, some uncertainty will always persist. Therefore, we encourage policies that allow for this uncertainty by considering a wide range of possible scenarios.


2008 ◽  
Vol 5 (3) ◽  
pp. 761-777 ◽  
Author(s):  
T. R. Duhl ◽  
D. Helmig ◽  
A. Guenther

Abstract. This literature review summarizes the environmental controls governing biogenic sesquiterpene (SQT) emissions and presents a compendium of numerous SQT-emitting plant species as well as the quantities and ratios of SQT species they have been observed to emit. The results of many enclosure-based studies indicate that temporal SQT emission variations appear to be dominated mainly by ambient temperatures although other factors contribute (e.g., seasonal variations). This implies that SQT emissions have increased significance at certain times of the year, especially in late spring to mid-summer. The strong temperature dependency of SQT emissions also creates the distinct possibility of increasing SQT emissions in a warmer climate. Disturbances to vegetation (from herbivores and possibly violent weather events) are clearly also important in controlling short-term SQT emissions bursts, though the relative contribution of disturbance-induced emissions is not known. Based on the biogenic SQT emissions studies reviewed here, SQT emission rates among numerous species have been observed to cover a wide range of values, and exhibit substantial variability between individuals and across species, as well as at different environmental and phenological states. These emission rates span several orders of magnitude (10s–1000s of ng gDW-1 h−1). Many of the higher rates were reported by early SQT studies, which may have included artificially-elevated SQT emission rates due to higher-than-ambient enclosure temperatures and disturbances to enclosed vegetation prior to and during sample collection. When predicting landscape-level SQT fluxes, modelers must consider the numerous sources of variability driving observed SQT emissions. Characterizations of landscape and global SQT fluxes are highly uncertain given differences and uncertainties in experimental protocols and measurements, the high variability in observed emission rates from different species, the selection of species that have been studied so far, and ambiguities regarding controls over emissions. This underscores the need for standardized experimental protocols, better characterization of disturbance-induced emissions, screening of dominant plant species, and the collection of multiple replicates from several individuals within a given species or genus as well as a better understanding of seasonal dependencies of SQT emissions in order to improve the representation of SQT emission rates.


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