Talk:Ophrys apifera

message: I assume that the bee orchid has evolved to look like a bee to attract pollinating bees. But the article doesn't say so. Could someone who knows, comment? William M. Connolley 21:35, 15 September 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: Darwin explained this in his book "The various contrivances by which orchids are fertilized by insects" (1862). He explains the great variety of orchids as an adaptation to their pollinators (mostly insects). This extreme specialisation gives them an almost unique status among all other plants (see the article Orchidaceae). They have built conspicuous flowers to attract insects. I' ve also explained the concept of 'pseudocopulation' in the article Ophrys. Darwin also concluded that allogamy (cross-fertilisation) is in most cases favourable to autogamy (self-fertilisation).
Pollination of Ophrys apifera happens by attracting sexually excited males, lured by visible cues (probably mostly in UV-light) and volatile chemicals (there are probably more than 100 different compounds involved). After pseudocopulation, duped male bees quickly learn to recognize the scent of visited flowers and avoid mating with them again. However, they visit flowers of the same species on a different plant. This means, that the Ophrys apifera has learnt to vary the different components of the chemical compounds, mostly saturated esters and aldehydes. This gives them a high degree of variation in their odour and increases the likelihood of being pollinated.
Such an evolution of chemical variation must have taken a long time to be perfected.  JoJan 08:51, 16 September 2005 (UTC)
thread_title: Evolution of mimicry

message: We need a photo of a bee trying to mate with a flower. Richard001 03:41, 30 September 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Need photo

message: According to the World Checklist of Monocotyledons (Royal Botanical Gardens, Kew), the given caption  Ophrys apifera var. aurita (Moggr.) Gremli, Neue Beitr. Fl. Schweiz 4: 31 (1887) 
is a synonym of the accepted Name : Ophrys apifera Huds., Fl. Angl.: 340 (1762). JoJan 19:13, 18 January 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Caption taxobox image 

message: As I am no longer a male bee, I am having some difficulty recalling the exact female shape to which I was supposed to be attracted.  My appreciation of these orchids is therefore hampered.
Could you kindly post a side-by-side comparison of two carefully chosen images, one of a bee orchid from the preferred direction it might be approached by a bee, the other of a bee that it might be mistaken for?
It may be quite worthwhile to post several comparisons, not just one.  Again, different possible angles of observation & approach could be a factor.
Knowledge of bee vision may be helpful.  As I recall, I did not see colors & shapes the same way as a human would.  Hasn't someone done a more realistic comparison?  Perhaps a link to an external site would help.  A loaned image with a link-footnote attached might lure such a site to, well, loan an image to us.  —Preceding unsigned comment added by Parsiferon (talk • contribs) 22:22, 12 March 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  Orchid/Bee image comparison request 

message: Having encountered my first Bee Orchid I came along here to compare my findings. The assertion that it is only found in Wales is questionable as I have seen a colony of over 80 plants in south Wiltshire, (yes, I know, no original research) and at no more than 85 metres above sea level. Am I lucky or is the habitat description a little too specific or out of date?. I will investigate a bit more. Richard Avery (talk) 15:43, 25 July 2011 (UTC)
replies: text: I notice one of the sources listed is "Pignatti S. - Flora d'Italia". I wonder if the assertion about being commonest above 3,000 m applies to Italy or in other southern parts of the plant's range. This shows how useful line-by-line footnoted sourcing can be.William Avery (talk) 19:28, 1 August 2011 (UTC)
thread_title:  Distribution? 

message: The scientific name is bad Latin: "apifera" when applied to a plant does not mean "bee-bearing", but "bee-bringing". "Bee-bearing" is "apigera". The suffix -fer may mean "-bearing" only when applied to human beings (e.g. signifer, a man, of course). -212.87.13.78 (talk) 17:14, 3 September 2013 (UTC)
replies: text: Maybe, but unfortunately that name has stuck. One would like botanists to be on point in their Latin, but all the scientific name has to do is distinguish the species from other ones. It doesn't have to be totally correct. Daniel Case (talk) 18:11, 6 September 2013 (UTC)
replies: text: OP above isn't saying that the Latin name is wrong (after all, the flower does bring bees), s/he is saying that the unsourced explanation of the etymology is wrong. The etymology should say "bee-bringing" unless there is a source for "bee-bearing." — Sam 63.138.152.168 (talk) 16:55, 12 September 2013 (UTC)
replies: text: The Latin name is wrong, because the flower does not 'bring' (i.e. create, yield, produce) bees, and that is what apifera means, when applied to a plant.  — Preceding unsigned comment added by 87.205.167.254 (talk) 11:57, 27 October 2016 (UTC)
thread_title:  Remark on the name 

message: Hello fellow Wikipedians,
I have just modified 2 external links on Ophrys apifera. Please take a moment to review my edit. If you have any questions, or need the bot to ignore the links, or the page altogether, please visit this simple FaQ for additional information. I made the following changes:
*Added archive https://archive.is/20130421005112/http://www.journallive.co.uk/north-east-news/todays-news/2008/06/21/orchid-colony-discovered-in-grass-verge-61634-21129155/ to http://www.journallive.co.uk/north-east-news/todays-news/2008/06/21/orchid-colony-discovered-in-grass-verge-61634-21129155/
*Added archive https://web.archive.org/web/20150430170312/http://www.plantlife.org.uk/wild_plants/county_flowers/ to http://www.plantlife.org.uk/wild_plants/county_flowers/
When you have finished reviewing my changes, you may follow the instructions on the template below to fix any issues with the URLs.
Cheers.—InternetArchiveBot (Report bug) 17:41, 12 January 2018 (UTC)
thread_title:  External links modified 

message: The citation for the claim that xkcd is wrong is a random person's Google Plus post, and the post itself refers back to Wikipedia.  Whether it's correct or not apparently remains up for debate, but either way it needs a better source or it should be removed.  We know that the Eucera longicornis pollinates it, so xkcd is at least wrong there, but I have not been able to find out if the original bee that it evolved to look like has gone extinct.  Also, as per the first section about xkcd on this talk page, perhaps it shouldn't be mentioned at all.    — dorianha bogelund «talk» 12:19, 16 February 2019 (UTC)
replies: text: There's no point in mentioning and then debunking xkcd. Omit it entirely. Plantdrew (talk) 05:15, 17 February 2019 (UTC)
replies: text: Thanks for the help, Plantdrew. :)   — dorianha bogelund «talk» 07:07, 17 February 2019 (UTC)
thread_title:  xkcd 2