"Declining Pollinators Prompt Plants to Reduce Nectar Production"
Originally Published 2 years ago — by Ars Technica
A study by French scientists has shown that a decline in pollinators has led to a 25% increase in self-pollination in modern pansy plants, along with a 20% reduction in nectar production, impacting rewards for pollinators such as bumblebees. The experiment used "resurrection ecology" to compare plants from the 1990s and 2000s with their modern counterparts, revealing rapid evolutionary changes in response to pollinator decline. The study suggests that this adaptation could have negative long-term consequences for the plants, and future research aims to investigate if similar patterns exist in other plant species and if plant evolution in response to pollinator decline could be reversible.