How is pollen carried

Use PollenNation when you see pollinators in your city, town, yard or garden. Share Print Site Map Give. Enter Search Terms Search. University of California, Agriculture and Natural Resources. University of California. How to Join Helpful Links. The pollen of animal-pollinated plants has a rough surface to help it stick to a pollinator. Many flowers use colours to attract insects, sometimes helped by coloured guiding marks. Some have ultraviolet marks that can be seen by insects but are invisible to human eyes.

Flowers are often shaped to provide a landing platform for visiting insects or to force them to brush against anthers and stigmas. It only has very small petals but big bright red clusters of stamens. Some flowers have scent to attract insects. Many of these scents are pleasing to humans too, but not all — some flowers attract flies with a smell of rotting meat. Bird-pollinated flowers tend to be large and colourful so birds can see them easily against a background of leaves.

Some flowers even change colour to tell birds when to visit. Most bird-pollinated flowers have lots of nectar, often at the bottom of a tube of petals. Birds need to brush against anthers and stigmas when reaching for the sugary reward with their long beaks. The top of the pistil is called the stigma, and is often sticky. Seeds are made at the base of the pistil, in the ovule.

To be pollinated, pollen must be moved from a stamen to the stigma. When pollen from a plant's stamen is transferred to that same plant's stigma, it is called self-pollination. When pollen from a plant's stamen is transferred to a different plant's stigma, it is called cross-pollination. Cross-pollination produces stronger plants. The plants must be of the same species. For example, only pollen from a daisy can pollinate another daisy. Pollen from a rose or an apple tree would not work.

P ollination occurs in several ways. People can transfer pollen from one flower to another, but most plants are pollinated without any help from people. Usually plants rely on animals or the wind to pollinate them. When animals such as bees, butterflies, moths, flies, and hummingbirds pollinate plants, it's accidental.