Dear All I realised that last year I uploaded a pic of same series, so may be this pic could be discarded from this years photo of the year !! Please accept my apologies for the mistake. Best regards Pankaj
On Thu, Jan 2, 2014 at 5:29 PM, Pankaj Kumar <[email protected]> wrote: > Pollination in Orchid is really an extravagant activity and many > species input a lot of effort to attract pollinators so as to help the > plant in getting pollinated. > The genus Bulbophyllum is one such group where resins and oils are > secreted by glands located on various parts of the flowers including > petals, sepals and labellum. Insect visit these flowers and crawl upon > various parts of the flower licking oils and resins from floral > surfaces. Very often they crawl onto the labellum which is very > flexible and hinged towards inner side and can even shake with moving > wind, giving illusion of a living organism. The labellum is perfectly > balanced and can take the weight of the insect. As the insect walks > toward inner side the labellum, due to shift of weight towards inner > side the labellum turns up and insect is pushed towards the stigma on > the column. On both sides of stigma are claw like structures called > stylidia. When the insect is pushed inside due to uplifting of the > labellum, stylidia gets stuck on the back of the insect. Feeling > trapped, the insect wants to come out and while struggling to do so, > it can either dislodges the operculum and carry the sticky pollinia > outside, or, if it is already carrying a pollinia then inserts exactly > onto the stigmatic cavity. > The Orchid in this pic is Bulbophyllum lasiochilum Parish & Rchb.f. > and the insect is a Hoverfly. There is no pollinia on the back of the > insect yet, but then it all depends on the matter of luck. All flowers > don't get pollinated after-all. It is a natural way of delimiting > sexual reproduction in plants. > Hope you all will like this pic. > Best regards and happy new year 2014. > Pankaj > > > -- > *********************************************************** > Pankaj Kumar, Ph.D. > IUCN-SSC Orchid Specialist Group Asia > > Office: > Conservation Officer > Orchid Conservation Section > Flora Conservation Department > Kadoorie Farm and Botanic Garden (KFBG) Corporation > Lam Kam Road, Tai Po, New Territories, Hong Kong. > Residence: > 151, 1st Floor, Tai Om Tsuen > Lam Tsuen, Tai Po, New Territories, Hong Kong. > > email: [email protected]; [email protected] > Phone: +852 2483 7128 (office - 8:30am to 5:00pm); +852 9436 6251 > (mobile). Fax: +852 2483 7194 -- *********************************************************** Pankaj Kumar, Ph.D. IUCN-SSC Orchid Specialist Group Asia Office: Conservation Officer Orchid Conservation Section Flora Conservation Department Kadoorie Farm and Botanic Garden (KFBG) Corporation Lam Kam Road, Tai Po, New Territories, Hong Kong. Residence: 151, 1st Floor, Tai Om Tsuen Lam Tsuen, Tai Po, New Territories, Hong Kong. email: [email protected]; [email protected] Phone: +852 2483 7128 (office - 8:30am to 5:00pm); +852 9436 6251 (mobile). Fax: +852 2483 7194 -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "efloraofindia" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to [email protected]. To post to this group, send email to [email protected]. Visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/indiantreepix. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/groups/opt_out.
