Ipomoea bahiensis pollinators: Bees or butterflies?

Ipomoea bahiensis presents many characters of a psychophilous nectar flower. At the investigated synanthropic site, it is, however, visited and pollinated primarily by pollen-foraging small to medium sized bees that leave the flowers well before the end of anthesis. The busy bees appear to intimidate, probably by their mere existence, butterflies that function as pollinators in early morning, but disappear from the scene after beginning of anthesis. The plant is allogamous. A higher fruit set in hand cross-pollinated flowers as compared to naturally pollinated controls indicates pollen limitation. For the first time, we observed male bees entering the closing flowers as an overnight accommodation even before noon.     

6 or 9?

In this article the author offers an original interpretation of patterns found on the world's most ancient felts (Fifth Century BCE). These artifacts have been recovered from frozen burial mounds in the Altai Mountains. The interpretation presented here constitutes a new approach to the study of ornamentation as a system of symbols.