Question

We have studied a population of annual plants whose flowers have bright red nectar guides that vary in area and are visited by a diversity of pollinators (bees, hummingbirds, flies, etc.). The mean area of the nectar guides in the population was 2 cm2 in 2015. Right after we measured the nectar guides, the field was sprayed with insecticides which killed all insect pollinators. Thus, hummingbirds, which prefer small nectar guides, became the main pollinator. We measured the nectar guides again in 2016 (one generation later), and the new mean area of nectar guides was 1 cm2. A) Based on this information what was the the evolutionary response to selection (R); B) What is the selection differential (S), assuming that the heritability (h2) is equal to 0.30?

Answer 1