Consequences of the Argentine ant, Linepithema humile (Mayr), invasion on pollination of Euphorbia characias (L.) (Euphorbiaceae)

We have studied the influence of the Argentine ant, Linepithema humile, on the pollination of Euphorbia characias, a deciduous insect-pollinated shrub. The observations were made in two adjacent areas (invaded and non-invaded by L. humile) in a Mediterranean cork-oak forest. In the invaded area, L. humile has replaced most of the native ants that climb up this plant's inflorescences. Five native ant species were detected in the non-invaded areas and only one in the invaded area. The number of visitors to infested inflorescences (1.54 ± 1.86 visitors/10 min observation) was lower than in non-infested inflorescences in the invaded area (3.74 ± 4.19 visitors/10′), and in the non-invaded areas (4.16 ± 5.00 visits/10′). For several species of flower-visiting insects, no differences were detected between the time spent in the flowers and the number of flowers visited in the two areas, except for Eristalis tenax, a dipteran which visited more flowers (15.2 ± 11.1 flowers visited/10′) and spent more time (9.4 ± 5.8 sec) in the non-invaded area than in the invaded area (7.8 ± 8.2 flowers visited/10′ and 5.3 ± 2.1 sec, respectively). The relative representation of insect orders in the two areas was not different. A significant reduction in fruit-set and seed-set was detected in the invaded area. These results suggest that the Argentine ant may greatly affect the reproductive success of components of the Mediterranean flora.