Pollination and Environmental Conservation

Abstract

Pollination interrelationships constitute vital, and often very precise, links in environmental productivity. The co-dependence of much of the native fauna and flora in these terms is cause for grave concern in the light of continuing environmental pollution. In New Brunswick, as an established case-history, wide-scale forest applications of the organophosphorus insecticide Fenitrothion have severely damaged the native pollinator fauna of lowbush blueberries, and. have apparently disrupted bird populations so that they have become unprecedented agricultural pests. Unfortunately, little is known of the pollination interrelationships in natural or semi-natural environments. Very often the reproductive biology of the plants is incompletely known, and if pollen vectors are involved they, too, are unknown. This point is illustrated by assessing the state of knowledge of such showy plants as are emblematic in Canada (Table I).