Busy Bees: Variation in Insect Flower-Visiting Rates across Multiple Plant Species

Figure 3

Insect pollinator groups significantly differ in the rate at which they probe flowers. Bumble bees (11.5 flowers/minute) and honey bees (9.2 flowers/minute) have the quickest rate of flower visitation, whereas beetles are the slowest (2.2 flowers/minute). Letters display post hoc results, where groups that share letters do not significantly differ. All pairwise comparisons significantly differed from each other, with the exception of flies and butterflies as well as flies and moths. Groups are ranked according to their flower probing rate. Box lines report medians and lower and upper quartiles, and whiskers extend either to maximum or minimum data points or to 1.5 times the interquartile range.