Hummingbirds and plants, mutual evolution

2003/06/01 Elhuyar Zientzia Iturria: Elhuyar aldizkaria

• Eboluzioa

Some researchers have concluded that in some Caribbean islands, the appearance of hummingbird peaks and some floral varieties have evolved together. In addition, as with Darwin's txontes, this evolution has occurred differently from island to island.

Researchers have published their work in the journal Science. In a previous study, they observed that the purple hummingbird of the island of St. Lucia likes a variety of the plant called Heliconia hibai, while the female chooses another variety of the same species and another species discarded by the male: H. Caribbean.

Current research has turned to the island of Dominica, where the opposite happens: in the lower part of the island there are two varieties of plant H. caribbean, each sex chooses a variety, while in the upper part only the male hits H. hibai.

The shape of each variety of the heliconia plant coincides with that of the peaks of each sex, which is related to the amount of nectar that the colibrias can take. In view of this, they conclude that there has been a mutual evolution.