''Marcgravia evenia'' is a species of flowering

vine A vine is any plant with a growth habit of trailing or scandent (that is, climbing) stems, lianas, or runners. The word ''vine'' can also refer to such stems or runners themselves, for instance, when used in wicker work.Jackson; Benjamin; Da ...

in the family

Marcgraviaceae The Marcgraviaceae are a neotropical angiosperm family in the order Ericales. The members of the family are shrubs, woody epiphytes, and lianas, with alternate, pinnately nerved leaves. The flowers are arranged in racemes. The flowers are accom ...

. Within this family it belongs to the Galetae group, which is characterized by a long

inflorescence In botany, an inflorescence is a group or cluster of flowers arranged on a plant's Plant stem, stem that is composed of a main branch or a system of branches. An inflorescence is categorized on the basis of the arrangement of flowers on a mai ...

axis and boat shaped

nectar Nectar is a viscous, sugar-rich liquid produced by Plant, plants in glands called nectaries, either within the flowers with which it attracts pollination, pollinating animals, or by extrafloral nectaries, which provide a nutrient source to an ...

ies. The plant is

endemic Endemism is the state of a species being found only in a single defined geographic location, such as an island, state, nation, country or other defined zone; organisms that are indigenous to a place are not endemic to it if they are also foun ...

Cuba Cuba, officially the Republic of Cuba, is an island country, comprising the island of Cuba (largest island), Isla de la Juventud, and List of islands of Cuba, 4,195 islands, islets and cays surrounding the main island. It is located where the ...

. The

of M. evenia is extraordinary. At the upper end of the pendant inflorescence are several concave bracts set at an angle to reflect and focus sonar pulses from

bats Bats are flying mammals of the order Chiroptera (). With their forelimbs adapted as wings, they are the only mammals capable of true and sustained flight. Bats are more agile in flight than most birds, flying with their very long spread-out ...

, helping the bats to locate the flowers. In the middle of the inflorescence is a discoid circle (or single-whorled umbel) of about twenty tubular

tetramerous Merosity (from the greek "méros," which means "having parts")) refers to the number of component parts in a distinct whorl of a plant structure. The term is most commonly used in the context of a flower where it refers to the number of sepals in a ...

flowers. Below these is a second set of bracts very different from the reflective ones These are modified into

extrafloral nectaries Nectar is a viscous, sugar-rich liquid produced by plants in glands called nectaries, either within the flowers with which it attracts pollinating animals, or by extrafloral nectaries, which provide a nutrient source to animal mutualists, ...

which is why the bats are interested, and can be enlisted as pollinators. Inflorescences with two different kinds of bracts are quite rare. although the common poinsettia (Euphorbia pulcerima) is one such.

Bat ecology

''Marcgravia evenia'' relies on '' Monophyllus'', a Cuban nectar-feeding bat, for pollination. This plant has evolved bowl shaped leaves which act as reflectors for a bat's biosonar. This helps the bats to find the plants with greater ease and hence pollinate them with more frequency. The shape of the leaves also helps to guide the bats in locating the hidden feeders. The reflectors are convergent with those of a Bornean pitcher plant, ''

Nepenthes hemsleyana ''Nepenthes hemsleyana'' is a tropical pitcher plant endemism, endemic to Borneo, where it grows in peat swamp forest and heath forest below 200 m above sea level. The specific epithet (botany), specific epithet ''hemsleyana'' honours Engli ...

'', that attracts bats to its pitchers as roosting sites and uses bat guano as a source of nutrition.

References

External links

* * * * * evenia Endemic flora of Cuba Vines {{ericales-stub