FLORAL BIOLOGY OF Pleroma granulosum (DESR.) D. DON AND FIDELITY OF HYMENOPTERA FLORAL VISITORS Carine U. Moya, José Washington Santos Oliveira, Sandra Milena Diaz Puentes, Renata Gomes de Oliveira Guerreiro

Abstract

Pleroma granulosum (Desr.) D. Don belongs to the Melastomataceae, a family with about 4.200 to 4.500 species in the world. It has arboreal size and is found in the Atlantic Forest biome. Based on the characteristics of the flower, the aims of this study were to evaluate the flower's phenology and reproductive biology and to characterize the floral visitors. Then, three pink and three purple trees were used, in which flowers were selected in different blooming stages to measure morphological data and to analyze the floral visitors. This species has pentameric flower, actinomorphic, with heterantery, with viable pollen in both anther sizes, characterized by being tricolpated, radial, and small in size. The receptivity of stigma is greater in the second stage. The tips of the anthers and the stigma have flavonoids to attract pollinators. The floral visitors identified belong to five families of Hymenoptera. The Anthophoridae family was dominant and even without having 100% fidelity; its frequency, constancy and abundance make the visitors of this family as the most effective floral visitor to carry out pollination, the Halictidae family is the one that showed the greatest fidelity, but its behavior does not favor fertilization in flowers of P. granulosum because during the visits, they touch only on the male structures.