Fig. 5.

Orco KO gravid hawkmoths have reduced attraction toward nonflowering D. wrightii; however, females that flew to the plant used olfactory-directed flight behaviors. (A) The percentage of mated M. sexta females that flew and contacted a nonflowering D. wrightii plant (stimulus source) was significantly reduced in KOs compared with WT and HET females (χ² = 11.261; degrees of freedom = 2; P = 0.004; Holm corrected test of equal proportions). (B) Time to contact was measured from take-off to physical contact on the plant. Orco KO female time to the stimulus source was not significantly different compared with WT and Orco HET (Kruskal–Wallis H test). Box plots show the median net contact time (horizontal line in the box), the 25th and 75th percentiles (lower and upper margins of the box) together with the 1.5× interquartile range (whiskers), and individual data points (circles). (C) Three-dimensional flight tracks in response to the plant stimulus, hawkmoth (not to scale) depicts start of flight toward nonflowering plant (not to scale). Flight tracks were chosen based on time to contact median values. (D) Two-dimensional heat map representation of the cumulative relative distribution of all tracked hawkmoths data from start to source; sample size (n). Single pixels represent points of relative transit of the hawkmoth color-coded from maximum transit (red) to no transit (dark blue) (see color bar). (E) The relative frequency of track angle (flight direction relative to the wind) toward the nonflowering plant is shown as the percentages of track angles toward stimulus source (0°). (F) The percentage of total females that elicited oviposition behaviors (contact on leaf and abdomen curl) on whole D. wrightii plant were significantly reduced in the KOs compared with HET or WT females (χ² = 13.735; degrees of freedom = 2; P = 0.001; Holm corrected test of equal proportions). (G) Fifty-five percent of total Orco KO females laid a similar number of eggs on D. wrightii plants compared with WT and Orco HET. Bars and error bars represent mean ± SD, with no significant differences between genotypes (not significant; one-way ANOVA).