Abstract
Pollination contributes to an estimated one third of global food production, through both the improvement of the yield and the quality of crops. Volatile compounds emitted by crop flowers mediate plant-pollinator interactions, but differences between crop varieties are still little explored. We investigated whether the visitation of crop flowers is determined by variety-specific flower volatiles using strawberry varieties (Fragaria x ananassa Duchesne) and how this affects the pollination services of the wild bee Osmia bicornis L. Flower volatile compounds of three strawberry varieties were measured via headspace collection. Gas chromatography showed that the three strawberry varieties produced the same volatile compounds but with quantitative differences of the total amount of volatiles and between distinct compounds. Electroantennographic recordings showed that inexperienced females of Osmia bicornis had higher antennal responses to all volatile compounds than to controls of air and paraffin oil, however responses differed between compounds. The variety Sonata was found to emit a total higher level of volatiles and also higher levels of most of the compounds that evoked antennal responses compared with the other varieties Honeoye and Darselect. Sonata also received more flower visits from Osmia bicornis females under field conditions, compared with Honeoye. Our results suggest that differences in the emission of flower volatile compounds among strawberry varieties mediate their attractiveness to females of Osmia bicornis. Since quality and quantity of marketable fruits depend on optimal pollination, a better understanding of the role of flower volatiles in crop production is required and should be considered more closely in crop-variety breeding.
Highlights
The global increase in food demand, due to a rapidly rising world population [1], highlights the importance of world food security [2]
Declining pollinator populations are threatening pollination services [6] and highlight the need to expand the knowledge-base of bee-flower interactions in order to maintain pollination services [7]
Floral scent can have a great influence on attracting pollinators, and flower volatile compounds have been suggested as the main drivers for visitation decisions by pollinators, including flower constancy [7,9,10]
Summary
The global increase in food demand, due to a rapidly rising world population [1], highlights the importance of world food security [2]. Floral scent can have a great influence on attracting pollinators, and flower volatile compounds have been suggested as the main drivers for visitation decisions by pollinators, including flower constancy [7,9,10]. These studies have focused mainly on honeybees, bumble bees [10] and a few specialised wild bee species [7]. Only four studies investigated the influence on pollinator attraction of varieties differing in volatile emissions [12,16,17,19], but mainly focused on honeybees
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