Effects of Soil Quality Enhancement on Pollinator-Plant Interactions

Table 2

Effect of soil treatment on pollinator responses to cucumber plants in field assays. Two-way choice in 2008 and 2009 included CF (potting soil plus Osmocote 14-14-14 at the label rate) and VC (potting soil plus 33% vermicompost) treatments. Four way choice field assays in 2010 included CF, VC, NF (potting soil without fertilizer), and VCEQ (potting soil plus slow release fertilizer with equivalent NPK as those provided by vermicompost) treatments. Values represent means ± SE from 11, 14 and 8 replicates for each season respectively. Means within rows followed by the same superscript letter are not significantly different (Tukey’s mean separation test, 𝑃>0.05).

Year	Response variables	CF	VC	NF	VCEQ
2008	Discovery time	10.3 ± 2.68^a	7.7 ± 1.86^a	NA	NA
	Number Visits	8.3 ± 1.68^a	9.1 ± 0.86^a	NA	NA
	Visit length (min)	1.1 ± 0.32^a	1.9 ± 0.29^b	NA	NA
	Bumblebee (%)	66.4 ± 8.25^a	65.4 ± 8.67^a	NA	NA
	Honey bees (%)	11.7 ± 5.79^a	8.0 ± 4.5^a	NA	NA
	Other native bees (%)	21.8 ± 9.53^a	26.4 ± 9.26^a	NA	NA
2009	Discovery time	7.7 ± 1.84^a	3.92 ± 1.05^b	NA	NA
	Number Visits	13.4 ± 1.72^a	15.6 ± 1.88^a	NA	NA
	Visit length (min)	1.3 ± 0.14^a	2.1 ± 0.24^b	NA	NA
	Bumblebee (%)	94.3 ± 32.82^a	81.0 ± 27.17^a	NA	NA
	Honey bees (%)	0 ± 0.0^a	0 ± 0.0^a	NA	NA
	Other native bees (%)	5.6 ± 1.76^a	18.9 ± 3.38^b	NA	NA
2010	Discovery (min)	20.5 ± 3.96^b	13.9 ± 3.81^c	43.4 ± 1.62^a	19.6 ± 3.61^b
	Number Visits	3.6 ± 1.26^a	7.0 ± 2.22^a	3.1 ± 1.20^a	3.0 ± 1.41^a
	Visit length (min)	0.18 ± 0.07^b	0.67 ± 0.23^c	0.05 ± 0.08^a	0.20 ± 0.08^b
	Bumblebee (%)	43.3 ± 16.75^a	24.2 ± 11.66^a	22.8 ± 9.72^a	48.9 ± 18.52^a
	Honey bees (%)	19.2 ± 12.31^a	26.1 ± 9.99^a	26.9 ± 12.71^a	13.5 ± 12.39^a
	Other native bees (%)	12.5 ± 12.50^a	49.6 ± 15.70^b	12.8 ± 8.31^a	12.5 ± 12.50^a