Lesson 4 ·Class 9 · Pollination and Fertilization · Sort Lab
Agents of Pollination
Read the flower and name its courier.
Each feature suits one agent of pollination. Which?
Sorted 0/9
All items sorted — check each bin.
Free play — sort every item into the bin it belongs in; each correct drop tells you why. Switch to when you're ready to test yourself.
Ask what the agent can perceive. Wind cannot see, so wind-pollinated flowers stop advertising and spend everything on pollen instead.
What this lesson covers
What you do
- Notice the trade-off: insect flowers make little pollen but spend on petals and nectar; wind flowers do the opposite.
Challenges to clear
- Fill the Wind bin correctly.
- Now fill the Insect bin.
- Sort every feature.
- Fill the Water box — the rarest agent of the three.
The task
Each feature suits one agent of pollination. Which?
What this lesson covers
- Wind — Anemophily: Flowers small, dull and without scent (No point advertising to something that cannot see or smell.); Pollen dry, light and produced in huge amounts (Most of it is lost, so the plant must make enormous quantities.); Stigma large and feathery, hanging outside the flower (A big net to catch pollen drifting past.)
- Insect — Entomophily: Flowers large, brightly coloured and scented (Colour and scent are advertisements.); Produces nectar as a reward (The insect comes for food and leaves carrying pollen.); Pollen sticky or spiny so it clings to a body (It has to survive the journey on an insect's hairs.); Petals marked with lines leading inward (Nectar guides steer the visitor past the anthers and stigma.)
- Water — Hydrophily: Found in submerged aquatic plants like Vallisneria (The rarest agent — most water plants still use wind or insects.); Pollen light and unwettable, carried on the water surface (It must float to the stigma without being ruined.)
Hint
Ask what the agent can perceive. Wind cannot see, so wind-pollinated flowers stop advertising and spend everything on pollen instead.