Naoto Sugiura and Yasuhiro Uehara, Associate Professor of the Graduate School of Advanced Sciences, Kumamoto University, have a symbiotic relationship in which the plants of the family Ericaceae "Ginryoso" are sprayed with seeds in exchange for providing fruit meat to the German cockroach. I found that.
There are many known examples of plants in which seeds are sprayed in return for providing food (flesh) to vertebrates such as birds and mammals.On the other hand, it can be said that insects play a role of seed dispersal, except for the mode in which ants carry the seeds themselves.
This time, the group conducted two-year observations of animals visiting the fruits of Monotropastrum humilis in two forests in Kumamoto City, day and night.As a result, it was found that birds and mammals are not interested in the fruits of Monotropastrum humilis, and only the German cockroach, Blattella nipponica, constantly feeds on the fruits and excretes seeds as dung, and the survival rate of the excreted seeds does not decrease. rice field.From these and other survey results, it was concluded that "Monotropastrum humilis is a plant that has cockroaches spray seeds."
Regarding the mutualism between plants and cockroaches, several cases of pollen-borne plants have been reported so far.However, the group is the first in the world to discover a plant whose seeds are sprayed by cockroaches, and it is also the first case in that the seed disperser is a "flying" insect species.
Paper information:[Botanical Journal of the Linnean Society] Cockroach-mediated seed dispersal in Monotropastrum humile (Ericaceae): a new mutualistic mechanism
