Pollinators Diversity For Tomatoes Crop Under Agro-Forest Ecosystem Of Dera Ghazi Khan Punjab Pakistan

Abstract

Pakistan is a country where very little is known about the biodiversity of insect pollinators and their interaction with flowering plants. Insect pollinators are the amongst our natural resources because pollination is the most important ecosystem service performed by the insects and plays a vital role in the socio-economic status of human being. The given study was carried out in an agro-forest ecosystem of Dera Ghazi Khan to evaluate the insect pollinators’ diversity. Insect pollinators were collected from the flowers of tomatoes with the help of a hand net. Two species (Amegilla cingulate and A. chlorocyanea) of Amigella bees were found on the flowers abundantly followed by Giant honey bee (Apis dorsata) was also observed on the flowers of the tomato. Small honey bees (Apis mellifera., Apidae: Hymenoptera) were observed on the flowers and were captured successfully with the help of a hand net. The data were taken at the morning time when the weather was clear and sunny approximately at about 10am-12pm. As these insects belong to family Apidae and order Hymenoptera.. These bees visit the flowers abundantly and pollinate the flowers successfully. These insects were the main visitors of the tomato flowers but many other insects like Butterflies, moths, cabbage butterflies, Syrphid flies, earth wasps, carpenter bees, Skippers and Helicted bees were also observed and collected with the help of a hand net. Our results showed that pollinators may the increase in quantity and quality of the tomato fruit in the open field due to these pollinators.