Flower and leaf herbivory might cause relevant and negative impacts on plant fitness. While flower removal or damage by florivores produces direct negative effects on plant fitness, folivores affect plant fitness by reducing resource allocation to reproduction. In this study, we examine the effects of both flower and leaf herbivory by leaf-cutting ants on the reproductive success of the shrub species Miconia nervosa (Smith) Triana (Family Melastomataceae) in a fragment of Atlantic Forest in Northeast Brazil. We conducted a randomized block-designed field experiment with nine replicates (blocks), in which three plants per block were assigned to one of the three following treatments: undamaged plants (ant exclusion), leaf-damaged plants (ant exclusion from reproductive organs, but not from leaves), and flower + leaf-damaged plants (no exclusion of ants). We then measured flower production, fruit set, and fruit production. Our results showed that flower + leaf-damaged plants reduced flower production nearly twofold in relation to undamaged plants, while flower set in leaf-damaged plants remained constant. The number of flowers that turned into fruits (i.e., fruit set), however, increased by 15% in flower + leaf-damaged plants, while it slightly decreased in leaf-damaged compared to undamaged plants. Contrastingly, fruit production was similar between all treatments. Taken together, our results suggest a prominent role of ant floral herbivory across different stages of the reproductive cycle in M. nervosa, with no consequences on final fruit production. The tolerance of M. nervosa to leaf-cutting ant herbivory might explain its high abundance in human-modified landscapes where leaf-cutting ants are hyper-abundant.

中文翻译：

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解开切叶蚁的叶面与花卉食草对 Miconia nervosa (Smith) Triana (Family Melastomataceae) 植物繁殖成功率的影响

花叶草食可能对植物健康造成相关和负面影响。虽然食花动物的摘花或损害会对植物的适应性产生直接的负面影响，但食叶动物会通过减少对繁殖的资源分配来影响植物的适应性。在这项研究中，我们通过切叶蚂蚁研究了食草植物和花叶对灌木物种繁殖成功的影响微藻(Smith) Triana (Family Melastomataceae) 在巴西东北部大西洋森林的一片片断中。我们进行了一个随机区组设计的田间试验，有九个重复（区组），其中每个区组的三株植物被分配到以下三种处理中的一种：未受损的植物（蚂蚁排除），叶片受损的植物（蚂蚁从生殖器官中排除，但不是来自叶子）和花 + 叶子受损的植物（不排除蚂蚁）。然后我们测量了花卉产量、坐果量和水果产量。我们的研究结果表明，与未受损植物相比，花+叶受损植物的花产量减少了近两倍，而叶受损植物中的花朵保持不变。然而，在花+叶受损的植物中，变成果实（即坐果）的花朵数量增加了 15%，而叶片受损的植物与未受损的植物相比略有下降。相比之下，所有处理之间的果实产量相似。总之，我们的研究结果表明蚂蚁花草食在生殖周期的不同阶段的突出作用M. nervosa，对最终水果生产没有影响。的容忍度M. nervosa切叶蚂蚁食草可能解释了它在人类改造的景观中的高丰度，那里切叶蚂蚁非常丰富。