DOI: 10.5061/dryad.bnzs7h4cj
title: Data from: Influence of plant reproductive systems on the evolution of hummingbird pollination

description: Many hummingbird-pollinated plant species evolved from bee-pollinated
 ancestors independently in many different habitats in North and South
 America. The mechanisms leading to these transitions are not completely
 understood. We conducted pollination and germination experiments and
 analysed additional reproductive traits in three sister species pairs of
 which one species is bee- and the other hummingbird-pollinated. All
 hummingbird-pollinated species showed higher seed set and germination
 rates in cross-pollinated than in self-pollinated flowers. In the
 self-compatible, bee-pollinated sister species this difference did not
 exist. As expected, seed set and germination rate were higher after
 cross-pollination in the largely self-incompatible genus Penstemon
 independently of the pollination syndrome. However, the bird-pollinated
 species produce only half of the amount of ovules and pollen grains per
 flower compared to the bee-pollinated sister species. This indicates that
 hummingbird pollination is much more efficient in self-incompatible
 populations because hummingbirds waste less pollen and provide higher
 outcrossing rates. Therefore, hummingbird pollination is less resource
 costly. Overall, we suggest that hummingbirds may increase the
 reproductive success compared to bees, influencing the evolution of
 hummingbird pollination in ecosystems with diverse bee assemblages.
description: # Data from: Influence of plant reproductive systems on the evolution of
 hummingbird pollination This is the data set used for all analyses
 conducted in Abrahamczyk et al. 2022. Influence of plant reproductive
 systems on the evolution of hummingbird pollination. Ecology and
 Evolution, DOI: 10.1002/ece3.8621. For questions please contact Stefan
 Abrahamczyk
 ([stefan.abrahamczyk@uni-bonn.de](mailto:stefan.abrahamczyk@uni-bonn.de)).
 Explanation for table headings: | Species | Investigated plant species | |
 :--------------- |
 :------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- | | Pollinator group | Main pollinator group of the plant species based on pollination syndrome and observations | | Treatment | Treatment in the pollination experiments (manual self-pollination & manual cross pollination) | | Seed number | Number of seeds per capsule | | Seed weight | For Lobelia and Mimulus we counted out 10 times 10 individual seeds per capsule together and calculated a mean seed weight (in g) per capsule. The seeds of the Penstemon species are much larger and much less numerous per capsule. Thus, we weighed all fully developed seeds per capsule individually and calculated a mean per capsule. | | Pollen | Number of pollen grains per flower | | Ovules | Number of ovules per flower | | Germination rate | We used 100 seeds per capsule for the Lobelia and Mimulus species and all seeds from the Penstemon species. Germination rates were determined after two weeks in the incubator when most viable seeds have been germinated. | | SAM | In order to make seed set comparable across taxa and treatments we divided seed set by mean ovule number per species. We called the resulting variable relative seed set. | | Genus | Plant genus | | Ovule/pollen | Ratio of the number of ovules divided by the number of pollen grains per flower | NA = not applicable