Pollination and Reward: A Game-Theoretic Approach

This paper studies a stylized dynamic model of plant pollination, the main concern of which is to provide some insight into the evolution of costly pollination reward. As it turns out, the conclusions are quite different depending on whether pollinators or plants are assumed in relative scarcity. In the first case, the two monomorphic states (where all flowers either provide reward, or they do not) are both evolutionarily stable. In the second, there is instead a unique evolutionarily stable state, which is monomorphic or not depending on the rate of flower turnover. These conclusions appear well consistent with reported empirical evidence.