TIL almost all vanilla plants are pollinated by hand.
TIL almost all vanilla plants are pollinated by hand.
I was reading about Edmond Albius, the former slave who learned how to pollinate the vanilla plant (at age 12!), which is why we have commercial vanilla today.
Albius's manual pollination method is still used today, as nearly all vanilla is pollinated by hand.
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That’s only outside their native range. In Mexico, where they’re from, they’re pollinated by the Melipona bee. Mexico is currently 3rd place in vanilla production at 6.5%, so you’re not wrong to say the majority of vanilla plants are pollinated by hand, but they do have a natural pollinator. In theory, you could introduce the Melipona bee to areas where Vanilla has been imported to cut down the labor time/costs.
Thinks makes me wonder if they could make a "closed system" outside the natural range - like a giant greenhouse that includes the plant AND the bee.
Which would then turn into a movie-worthy story about the bees getting out and somehow causing the zombie apocalypse.
OR - it would just be BioDome with Pauly Shore. But with bees.
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You should edit the wikipedia entry and include this!
I just looked at the Wikipedia page and I think it’s fine. They’ve cited some sources which detail the debate about which pollinators actually pollinate the plant. Compared to someone who’s got a degree studying plants, I know basically nothing. I’m just repeating what I’ve heard. If they’ve got a list of pollinators and are trying to narrow down the right one, then they’re closer to the truth than I am.