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Tegeticula

Tegeticula
Sherwin Carlquist / CC BY-SA 3.0 · resizedfile
Yucca moths of the genus Tegeticula Most pollinators move pollen by accident while feeding. Female yucca moths do it on purpose. Using tentacle-like mouthparts found only in yucca moths, a female gathers a ball of pollen from one yucca flower, flies to another, lays her eggs in its ovary and then packs pollen onto the stigma, so the seeds her caterpillars need will actually develop. The caterpillars eat some of those seeds and leave the rest, and that trade has made the partnership one of the classic examples of obligate mutualism. Yuccas essentially depend on these moths to set seed, and the moths cannot breed anywhere else, so the loss of one would leave the other with no way forward.
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