Re: Pistia pollination

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Hiyer!

 

Dragonflies and damselflies are not pollinators. They are predators. They would not be around your pond unless there was plenty to eat! They are quite voracious, with the aquatic larvae eating the stuff in the pond and the adults eating whatever emerges or flies by. They are death on mosquito larvae, dayflying mosquitos, blackflies, gnats, midges and other flies. I have even watched them pluck spiders from the center of their webs.

 

One goofy thing is that in Jamaica and a few other Caribbean Islands (Julius and I discussed this together long ago) there are freshwater crabs that live in the water collected in bromeliad axils. There are damselflies that only lay their eggs in these little aquariums. They have an elongated abdomen to reach way back in to the axils. If a crab is present, they will grab the damselflies’ abdomen and reel it in. The crab will eat the damselfly, and maybe cut it up into small pieces for its young crabs swimming in the bromeliad tank. This still releases the damselfly’s eggs, which hatch, and the young damsels then are predators on the crab larvae. Go figure.

 

Happy days,

Christopher

 

 

D. Christopher Rogers

Senior Invertebrate Ecologist/ Taxonomist

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-----Original Message-----
From: aroid-l-bounces@gizmoworks.com [mailto:aroid-l-bounces@gizmoworks.com] On Behalf Of Taylor Holzer
Sent: Tuesday, January 20, 2009 1:52 PM
To: aroid-l@gizmoworks.com
Subject: [Aroid-l] Pistia pollination

 

i think that dragonflies may play a part in pollinating pistia, in my pond i had many dragonflies landing on tthe ones i had.

 

does anyone have a souce for pistia plants?

 

 

     

 

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