POLLEN LIMITATION AND THE CONTRIBUTION OF AUTONOMOUS SELFING TO FRUIT AND SEED SET IN A REWARDING ORCHID

摘要

Premise of the study: Although rewarding orchids are believed to have a high pollination efficiency, pollination success is often low, suggesting that rewarding orchids may be prone to pollen limitation. Assuming that selfing contributes significantly to fruit and seed set (i.e., reproductive assurance) and that the quality of selfed seeds is high (i.e., low inbreeding depression), it can be hypothesized that under these circumstances populations evolve to facultative or even complete self-pollination.