Pollination Biology

 
 
efloraofindia:”22102011MR3’’ ? Adulsa Pune: I hope the attached paper by Prof Shivanna would be interesting for most of us in connection with this thread. Pollination biology, breeding system of Adathoda vasica

Thank you … for this interesting paper on Pollination.

I learn the busy bee carries out the work of Pollination and the butterfly just wants the nectar!!. The three phases are so well described
Also it was interestiing to know that Adulsa is in use for the last 2000 years
I will see if I can get to see some fruits on the plant. Let us see how busy the bee gets!!

I didnt read the article yet so I have no idea what is it about.
Just wanted to tell you that Bees dont just collect nectar. It collects, waxs and resins with the help of which it makes hive.
There are many orchids which have proper wax and resin secretions on the labellum and then there are few orchids which have wax and resin deceit. Deceit in the sense, it looks like resins but its not actually resin.

There is a very lesser known branch of botany called, Melissopalynology. It is basically the study of pollen in honey.
Not much people are interested in it now a days but it has a very wise and wide implication. It can be assumed that pollen of the plant will contain medicinal properties, so if you place a box for of beehive or better say if you rear bee in a citrus farm then the honey will contain some medicinal properties of the same….

we used to get rose honey from konkan when i was a child…in india

in usa grocery stores sell clover honey, orange flower honey, mesquite honey, rosemary honey… as available locally… and many others that i dont/didnt buy because i am allergic to the pollen there in…

AND WHAT A CO-INCIDENCE…only yesterday I was reviewing a technique for isolating old… very old Pollen grains from rocks for Paleo- palnology… pollens stuck in mud that turned to stone and rocks over the eons… its just an armchair research because in Kolkata we dont even have a good organized effort to count or type the pollen in this highly polluted air that we breath… all respiratory ailments and conjunctivitis are chalked up by doctors/health department officials to virus !!!! not to air pollutants, particles and pollen… ( not discounting virus, but they are not the culprits in 100% of the cases).

I have a very good friend, Dr. Santosh Kumar Shah, at Birbal Sahani Institute of Paleobotany, Lucknow. He and his superior are good at isolating pollen from deep earth and snow etc.

Oh I thought I can tell you another story then.
You know how the age of orchids was determined.

In Dominic Republic, during an excavating work in a mine, they found this amber. Inside the amber they found one extinct insect called Proplebeia dominicana. And on the back of the insect was an orchid pollinia. On the basis of this pollinia they named a new genus and as well as species, Meliorchis caribea.
This article was published in Nature.
Please find the same attached with the mail.

DATING THE ORIGIN OF ORCHIDACEAE

on youtube you will find many shortclips.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tqjP3-6prwM&feature=related
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nKblFLivSoI&feature=related
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WJzXGM7aFEg&feature=related
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RrPCmBwkDzQ&feature=related

Bees is a very interesting topic and theit product is of high value. Because the honey contains pollen it has special properties, depending on what flower flower the pollens are.
My grandmother told us that the honey from Jambul (Syzygium cumini) जांभूळ is good for eyes. She used to say kakvi (काकवी, made by boiling sugercane juice) is the honey of poor people, because though it contains impurities, it contains some useful minerals.

Here in Germany the beekeapers move from one field to other with their Bee-Boxesand collect diff. sorts of honey. In Mediterranean countries there are many many different sorts of honey.

jurassic park of Orchids..
lets make up a fantasy story…
of little mermaid orchids… like these above in your pictures… flying out of the amber as soon as they were cut open…
Did you read about this unlucky fellow that was discovered in India, that looks like a dinosaur? http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/city/kolkata-/Unidentified-animal-chopped-to-death/articleshow/10458944.cms
Jurassic park all over…

No updates yet.. story was in this am TOI… kolkata … but the link I sent you does not have pictures or does it.. I dont see one…
the jaw and teeth rmind me of the tasmanian dogds, but the body whatever ois showing looks like hind legs are longer?
or the front legs were hacked… dont know…