Color spectrometers to explore flower and fruit color adaptions across the Caribbean

In order to reproduce, the majority of plants need both their flowers pollinated and their seeds dispersed by animals. As plant-animal interactions play a key role in plant reproduction and animal existence, it is important to understand when and why co-occurring species interact. In the recent decade, there has been a growing interest in the role of morphological traits, such as flower and bill length of nectar-feeding birds, in determining interactions within networks of plants and animals. In this project, I am at including color of flowers and fruits as predictor of plant-animal interactions, supporting longstanding natural history knowledge that fruit and flower color are adaptions to specific types of frugivores and pollinators.