Enhances production of coffee (Coffea robusta): The role of pollinator, forages potency, and honey production from Tetragonula sp. (Meliponinae) in Central Lombok, Indonesia

Supeno B, Erwan, Agussalim. 2021. Enhances production of coffee (Coffea robusta): The role of pollinator, forages potency, and honey production from Tetragonula sp. (Meliponinae) in Central Lombok, Indonesia. Biodiversitas 22: 4687-4693. The bees role as an agent of pollinators to improve the productivity of plants. This study was purposed to enhance coffee production (Coffea robusta) by roles of stingless bee Tetragonula sp. as pollinator agent, forages potency, and honey production. This study has been conducted in a coffee plantation in Lantan, Central Lombok, Indonesia. Several parameters were measured such as the number of bunches and flowers, production of nectar and pollen, sucrose nectar content, production of coffee, production of honey, honey stomach volume, and pollen weight. The results showed that the different observation time influenced the number of bunches, flowers, production of nectar and pollen, sucrose nectar content (P<0.01). The number of bunches ranged from 58.2 to 144.9 bunches/tree, the number of flowers 36.3 to 58.7 flowers/bunches, and 2,362.5 to 8.250.6 flowers/tree. Furthermore, the nectar production 9.16 to 33.85 g/tree, pollen production 1.72 to 5.95 g/tree, sucrose nectar content 20.6 to 35.0%. Estimation of coffee production before pollinated by Tetragonula sp. was 1,230.8 kg/ha, but after pollination by Tetragonula was increased it became 3,605.7 kg/ha (49.1%). Fruit production before pollinated by Tetragonula sp. was 2,127.2 fruit/tree, but after pollination by Tetragonula sp. increased to 8,309.2 fruit/tree (59.2%). Production of honey from Tetragonula sp. was 3.74 g/hive/5 months and in Apis cerana was 301.35 g/hive/5 months. It can be concluded that the Tetragonula sp. as an agent of pollinators can enhance the production of coffee and increase the biodiversity of coffee.

ACACIA WHITE AS A FEED RESOURCE FOR THE DEVELOPMENT OF BEE FAMILIES

The article presents the results of the research on the study of honey harvest conditions from white acacia and the possibility of their use by bee families of the Ukrainian steppe spawned in Vinnytsia region of the Forest-Steppe zone of Ukraine. It has established that the nectar productivity of acacia depends on weather conditions, the productivity of bee colonies on its strength, forage reserves and nectar productivity of honeybees. The aim of the work was to study the productive honey harvest from white acacia by bee families of the Ukrainian steppe breed in the apiaries of Svitanok-Agrosvit LLC, Bershad district, Vinnytsia region. Honey harvest conditions are represented by agricultural entomophilous honeysuckle and plants of forests, gardens, meadows, fields. Honey acacia, linden and sunflower honey harvests are productive. Honey productivity of bee families from white acacia averaged 9.7 kg, from linden - 3.1 kg more, sunflower - 15.6 kg more. The development of bee colonies is determined by the timing of flowering nectar-bearing plants and temperature. Prior to the flowering of white acacia, the families underwent a period of intensive growth, and during the honey harvest, the strength of the families increased 2.8 times. During the honey harvest from linden, the strength of families increased by 15%, sunflower - by 30%, which affected the increase in honey productivity. The flowering period of white acacia occurs in late May-early June. For the first five days, the air temperature and humidity were favorable for nectar production, and the wind speed was somewhat high. White acacia produces nectar during the day and per day the bee family of the control hive of medium strength produced from 2350 to 8400 g of nectar. In the first half of the day for the first 6 hours in the nest of the bee family was 65.5% of the nectar of daily income. One flower of white acacia secretes up to 5.3 mg of nectar under optimal weather conditions. At the beginning of the flowering period was 3.2 mg of nectar, on the third day - 5.3 mg, 4-9 days - the nectar content in the flower of white acacia was at the level of 4-4.2 mg, starting from day 10 the nectar content decreases to the mark 1.2 mg. Such a sharp decrease could be caused by high humidity and rainy days these days.

Keanekaragaman Serangga Penyerbuk di Perkebunan Sayuran Kelurahan Rurukan Kota Tomohon (Diversity of Pollinator Insects in the Vegetable Plantation of Rurukan, Tomohon City)

Keanekaragaman Serangga Penyerbuk di Perkebunan Sayuran Kelurahan Rurukan Kota Tomohon (Diversity of Pollinator Insects in the Vegetable Plantation of Rurukan, Tomohon City) Samuel Masawet, Roni Koneri*), Farha N.J.Dapas Jurusan Biologi, Fakultas Matematika dan Ilmu Pengetahuan Alam, Universitas Sam Ratulangi, Manado, Indonesia*E-mail: [email protected] Diterima 5 Juli 2019, diterima untuk dipublikasi 10 Agustus 2019 ABSTRAKKehadiran serangga penyerbuk sangat berperan penting dalam proses penyerbukan. Hal ini disebabkan karena serangga tersebut mentransfer tepungsari dari anther ke stigma yang menyebabkan terjadinya pembuahan. Penelitian ini bertujuan untuk menganalisis keanekaragaman serangga penyerbuk di perkebunan sayuran di Kelurahan Rurukan Kota Tomohon. Pengambilan sampel dilakukan pada tiga tipe lahan yaitu perkebunan labu siam, wortel, dan pinggir hutan. Pada masing-masing titik pengambilan sampel dibuat tiga plot berukuran 20m x 20m dengan jarak antar plot 20 m. Teknik pengamatan serangga penyerbuk menggunakan metode scan sampling. Hasil penelitian didapatkan 14 famili yang terdiri dari 24 spesies dan 2.185 individu. Ordo yang paling banyak ditemukan adalah Hymenoptera, sedangkan spesies yang memiliki kelimpahan tertinggi yaitu Apis nigrocincta. Keanekaragaman spesies penyerbuk tertinggi ditemukan pada lahan perkebunan wortel. Keanekaragaman spesies penyerbuk dipengaruhi oleh tipe perbunggaan, warna bunga, bau bunga dan kandungan nektar dari bunga. Kata kunci: Keanekaragaman, serangga penyerbuk, lahan pertanian, Desa Rurukan ABSTRACTThe presence of insect pollinators plays an important role in pollination processes. This is because the insects transfer the Tepungsari from anther to the stigma that causes the occurrence of fertilization. This research aims to analyse the diversity of insect pollinators in vegetable plantations in the village of Rurukan in Tomohon. Sampling was carried out on three types of land namely pumpkin plantations, carrots, and forest edges. At each sampling point was made three plots measuring 20 m x 20 m with a distance between plot was 20 m. Insect pollinators observation technique using sampling scan method. The results of the study gained 14 families consisting of 24 species and 2,185 individuals. The most widely discovered order was Hymenoptera, while the species which has the highest abundance was Apis nigrocincta. The highest diversity of the pollinator species was found on carrot plantation land. The diversity of pollinator species is influenced by the type of flowering, color of flowers, smell of flowers and the nectar content of flowers. Keywords: Diversity, pollinators Insects, agricultural land, Rurukan village.

Foraging choices balanced between resource abundance and handling concerns: how the honeybee, Apis mellifera, select the flowers of Robinia pseudoacacia

Nectar is a main resource harvested by foraging honeybees: their ability in selecting among flowers is the key to optimize resource collection. This ability is expected to be the result of co-evolutionary traits between the plant and the pollinator visiting it; notwithstanding, novel interactions may occur between native and invasive species. Analysing foraging efforts, flexibility and individual constrains has to be taken into account. The foraging pattern of the ubiquitous honeybee on Robinia pseudoacacia, a North-American species widely naturalized in European countries, grounds a perfect case study. The plant shows papilionate flowers especially reach in nectar, but their tripping mechanism is difficult for the small/light-weight honeybee. Yet Apis mellifera is known to pay frequent and constant visits to them: in fact, one of the most appreciated unifloral honey is produced out of R. pseudoacacia. The aim of this study was to understand when and how the bees overcome physical constraints to succeed in flower visits, and to what extent this flexibility extend from the individual to the species. Data were collected in Italy, through focal observations of foraging individuals, nectar content measurements and experiments with manipulated inflorescences. Results clearly indicate that nectar content changes accordingly to the state of flowers (visited or unvisited), which also show slight changes in appearance. Foraging individuals, able to detect these differences, perform active choices preferentially selecting already-visited flowers: lower in nectar content but easier to manipulate. Even if the choice is primarily driven by handling constraints, individual experience and strength of stimuli are prompting visits also to unvisited flowers, notwithstanding a higher risk of failure in resource collection. Behavioural plasticity matching a satisfactory compromise grounds the decision that maximizes the intake of resource balanced with the effort to gain it.

Hummingbirds have a greatly enlarged hippocampal formation

Both field and laboratory studies demonstrate that hummingbirds (Apodiformes, Trochilidae) have exceptional spatial memory. The complexity of spatial–temporal information that hummingbirds must retain and use daily is probably subserved by the hippocampal formation (HF), and therefore, hummingbirds should have a greatly expanded HF. Here, we compare the relative size of the HF in several hummingbird species with that of other birds. Our analyses reveal that the HF in hummingbirds is significantly larger, relative to telencephalic volume, than any bird examined to date. When expressed as a percentage of telencephalic volume, the hummingbird HF is two to five times larger than that of caching and non-caching songbirds, seabirds and woodpeckers. This HF expansion in hummingbirds probably underlies their ability to remember the location, distribution and nectar content of flowers, but more detailed analyses are required to determine the extent to which this arises from an expansion of HF or a decrease in size of other brain regions.

Extrafloral nectar content alters foraging preferences of a predatory ant

We tested whether the carbohydrate and amino acid content of extrafloral nectar affected prey choice by a predatory ant. Fire ants, Solenopsis invicta , were provided with artificial nectar that varied in the presence of carbohydrates and amino acids and were then provided with two prey items that differed in nutritional content, female and male crickets. Colonies of fire ants provided with carbohydrate supplements consumed less of the female crickets and frequently did not consume the high-lipid ovaries of female crickets. Colonies of fire ants provided with amino acid supplements consumed less of the male crickets. While a number of studies have shown that the presence of extrafloral nectar or honeydew can affect ant foraging activity, these results suggest that the nutritional composition of extrafloral nectar is also important and can affect subsequent prey choice by predatory ants. Our results suggest that, by altering the composition of extrafloral nectar, plants could manipulate the prey preferences of ants foraging on them.

The effect of nectar production to the gathering behaviour of honeybees and to the foraging activity of wild bees at apple flowers

Intensity of bee visitation (honeybees and wild bees), foraging behaviour of honeybees and nectar parameters (nectar production, sugar concentration, sugar content in nectars) were inspected at 18 apple cultivars for three consecutive years. Honeybee visitation was calculated to be some 3.07 bee visits at a single apple flower a day but wild bee activity was very low, only some 0.11 wild bee visits per flower per day. The nectar production (nectar content) of apple flowers was fairly different according to the cultivars and the nectar production (nectar content) of flowers was negatively correlated with the sugar concentration in nectar. Interestingly, at the majority of the inspected 18 cultivars the nectar production has shown minor or no changes in the morning and at the afternoon. The nectar production (nectar content) of flowers clearly encouraged the total bee activity at the inspected cultivars (r = 0.54). Bees visited abundant nectars with greater sugar concentration most intensely than lees abundant nectars with smaller sugar concentration. Nectar parameters, however, affected the activity of honeybees with different types of gathering behaviour in different way. More intense activity by pollen gatherer and mixed behaviour honeybees was observed at cultivars producing abundant nectar (pollen gatherers: r = 0.65, mixed behaviour: r = 0.79). The activity of pollen gatherer honeybees and of mixed behaviour bees, on the other hand, was negatively correlated to the sugar concentration in nectar (pollen gatherers: r = -0.51, mixed behaviour: r = -0.73). This can be explained by the fact that their behaviour was much more affected by the amount of pollen than by any nectar parameters. Accordingly, "mixed behaviour honeybees" should probably rather be called as "pollen gatherers with nectar load" instead of "nectar gatherers with pollen load", as widely used in literature. The activity of ineffective side worker nectar gatherers was greatly encouraged by the sugar concentration in nectar (p = 0.63), similarly to the pure (top) nectar gatherer honeybees (r = 0.72). There was a negative relationship between the nectar production (nectar content) of flowers and the activity of these behaviour classes (nectar gatherers: r = -0.47, side workers: r = -0.36). Concluding the findings we can state that the activity of pollen gatherers and mixed behaviour honeybees is strongly encouraged by greater nectar production (greater nectar content) of apple flowers. Their activity, however, is mostly dependent firstly on the amount of pollen. This is the reason why the sugar concentration is in a negative relationship to the activity of pure pollen gatherers and mixed behaviour bee. On the other hand, pure nectar gatherers and side worker nectar gatherers are greatly encouraged by the sugar concentration of apple nectar the amount of nectar was not a definite influence on their activity. Side worker honeybees occurred at each cultivar inspected, however, their ratio varied widely among cultivars. So we can draw the conclusion that, in contradiction with earlier believes, side worker nectar gathering is a general phenomenon at apple flowers. The activity of side workers depends first of all on the relative position of stamens and petals; however, low sugar concentration of nectars can probably moderate their activity but probably do not affect pollen gatherers and mixed behaviour bees. Wild bee visitation was very low; the wild bee species observed (Osmia cornuta, Andrena flavipes, Anthophora acervorum, Bombus terrestris, Bombus lapidarius and Halictus simplex) comprised some 3.44 per cent of the total bee visitation at apple flowers only. Wild bee visitation was in a positive correlation with the nectar production (nectar amount) of flowers (r = 0,4) and with the sugar content of nectar (r = 0.46) but it was negatively correlated with the sugar concentration in nectar (r = -0,27). Our result calls the attention to the importance of nectar parameters in the effective honeybee pollination of apple plantations. Most effective pollinating activity of honeybees can be expected in plantations with cultivars of high nectar production because this feature seem so encourage the activity of those behaviour classes (pure pollen gatherers and mixed behaviour bees) that are the most effective pollinating agents among honeybees.

Interrelationship of pollination conditions, fertilization and sunflower seed yield

Four commercially important sunflower hybrids (NS-H-45, NS-H-l 11, NS-H-702 and Velja) and their parental components (Ha-74B, Ha-98B, CMS-3-8B, Ha-26B, RHA-583, RHA-R-PI-2/1 and RHA-113N) were used over a period of two years to study the following traits: disk flower corolla length, nectar content, pollen viability, bee visitation, fertilization percentage and seed yield. Relations among the traits were determined by path coefficient analysis. The simple correlation coefficients showed that fertilization percentage and bee visitation had a highly significant influence on seed yield. The corolla length had a positive effect on nectar content, while nectar content had a significant negative influence on pollen viability. The highest significant direct influence on seed yield was that of fertilization percentage, while the effect on nectar content on seed yield was negative but not significant. The coefficient of determination was 0.8071.

Mode of inheritance and heritability of disc flower corolla length and nectar content in sunflower

Since disc flower corolla length and nectar content are the two most important parameters of attractiveness to pollinators in sunflower and we monitored them in the parental lines F[ hybrids, we thought it would be interesting to determine the mode of inheritance and heritability of these two traits. The mean values of disc flower corolla length ranged between 7.23-10.22 mm. Differences among most of the genotypes were significant Year had significant influence on the expression of this trait. In the inheritance of the corolla length, partial dominance of the parent with the smaller corolla length (NS-H-702) was observed when determining mode of inheritance relative to the parents. Relative to the parental average however it was not possible to determine the mode of inheritance in any of tile hybrid combinations. The nectar content means ranged from 2.08 to 15.54 mg/20 flowers and differences among most of the genotypes were significant. Partial dominance of the parent with the smaller nectar content mean was recorded in the inheritance of this trait (NS-H-702): Negative heterosis was found in the hybrid NS-H-45.

Phenotypic and genotypic variability of disc flower corolla length and nectar content in sunflower

The nectar content and disc flower corolla length are the two most important parameters of attractiveness to pollinators in sunflower. The phenotypic and genotypic variability of these two traits was studied in four commercially important hybrids and their parental components in a trial with three fertilizer doses over two years. The results showed that, looking at individual genotypes, the variability of disc flower corolla length was affected the most by year (85.38-97.46%). As the study years were extremely different, the phenotypic variance of the hybrids and parental components was calculated for each year separately. In such conditions, looking at all of the crossing combinations, the largest contribution to phenotypic variance of the corolla length was that of genotype: 57.27-61.11% (NS-H-45) 64.51-84.84% (Velja); 96.74-97.20% (NS-H-702) and 13.92-73.17% (NS-H-111). A similar situation was observed for the phenotypic variability of nectar content, where genotype also had the largest influence, namely 39.77-48.25% in NS-H-45; 39.06-42.51% in Velja; 31.97-72.36% in NS-H-702; and 62.13-94.96% in NS-H-111.