Contrasting reproductive strategies and their functional consequences in two populations of Opuntia robusta (Cactaceae)
Citlalli H S Mendoza-Reyes, Adán Miranda-Pérez, Juan Núñez-Farfán, Mariusz Krzysztof Janczur · 2026
Read Contrasting reproductive strategies and their functional consequences in two populations of Opuntia robusta (Cactaceae) by Citlalli H S Mendoza-Reyes, Adán Miranda-Pérez, Juan Núñez-Farfán, Mariusz Krzysztof Janczur (2026) in the Tower of Babel, a free online library of public-domain works preserved in clean, searchable text. No sign-up. The full text is served as a plain-text file at a predictable URL, where text is present: https://antarctic-labs.com/tower-of-babel/pmc-13595634.txt.
Description
Two populations of the same prickly pear cactus, growing at different heights in central Mexico, have drifted into different sex lives. Citlalli Mendoza-Reyes and co-authors compared their flowers, pollen and ovule budgets, seed performance, and visitors in 2026. One population is fully hermaphroditic; the other mixes females, males, and hermaphrodites.
Both can set seed by self-pollination, but they invest differently in male and female roles, and their seedlings germinate differently. Bee crowds throng one site while a single beetle-and-bee cast serves the other, and certain visitors track better germination. The authors say mating systems can diverge over short distances, with consequences for how stable each arrangement remains.
Catalog record
| CREATOR | Citlalli H S Mendoza-Reyes, Adán Miranda-Pérez, Juan Núñez-Farfán, Mariusz Krzysztof Janczur |
|---|---|
| YEAR | 2026 |
| COLLECTION | PAPERS |
| FORMAT | TXT |
| FILE SIZE | 73 KB |
| VERSION | 1.0 |
| LICENSE | CC BY 4.0 |
| RIGHTS | CC BY |
| SOURCE | Europe PMC |