Fine‐scale temporal dynamics of flower visitors sheds light on insect‐assemblage overlap between sexes in a dioecious Ecuadorian palm

Dioecious plants generally display sexual dimorphism in male and female floral traits, potentially attracting slightly different pollinator communities. The sharing of common floral visitors between male and female flowers and their timing of visits to both sexes is of critical importance to ensure plant's reproductive success. Palm inflorescences are visited by abundant and diverse insect communities, yet the temporal patterns of insect visits on both sexes remain poorly known. We characterized the composition of a community of flower‐visiting arthropods associated with the dioecious ivory palm (Phytelephas aequatorialis, Spruce) in a pre‐montane forest of Ecuador. We monitored the temporal variations in insect visits along the flowering of 12 inflorescences (eight female and four male) using interception traps recovered every 4 h. We report 59 morphospecies in the arthropod community, dominated by three beetle families: Staphylinidae, Nitidulidae, and Curculionidae. Male inflorescences were more abundantly visited than female, but visitors of the later were taxonomically more diverse. Among the 16 pollinator candidates identified, nine visited both inflorescence sexes synchronously at dusk /night whereas the others did so asynchronously during the day. Our study provides new insights into the pollination mechanism of P. aequatorialis. We found evidence of differential pollinator attraction between floral sexes, which may be explained by the sexual dimorphism of both flowers. Synchronicity in dusk/night visits of both inflorescence sexes suggests a sexual synchronization of the signal used to attract pollinators. in Spainsh is available with online material RESUMO Las plantas dioicas muestran generalmente un dimorfismo sexual en los rasgos florales masculinos y femeninos, atrayendo potencialmente comunidades de polinizadores ligeramente diferentes. El intercambio de visitantes florales comunes entre las flores masculinas y femeninas y la hora de visitas a ambos sexos es de vital importancia para asegurar el éxito reproductivo de la planta. Las inflorescencias de las palmeras son visitadas por abundantes y diversas comunidades de insectos, pero los patrones temporales de las visitas de los insectos a ambos sexos siguen siendo poco conocidos. Caracterizamos la composición de una comunidad de artrópodos que visitan las flores asociadas a una palma dioica, la palma de marfil (Phytelephas aequatorialis, Spruce), en un bosque premontano de Ecuador. Se monitorea