Plants from the Balanophoraceae family are unusual organisms. They resemble either tubers or fungi: scaly inflorescences on fleshy stems with tiny leaves, colored red, purple, brown, or yellow.
The fact is that Balanophoraceae are parasites that inhabit the roots of various plants. They lack chlorophyll, making their green parts completely unnecessary, and almost all of their organs are significantly reduced. However, reproduction requires flowers, and for that, pollinators are necessary.
In one representative of the Balanophoraceae, Scybalium fungiforme (whose species name, fungiforme, translates to “fungus-like”), the flowers are protected by bracts or covering leaves. For a pollinator to reach the flower, it must push aside or break the bract. However, in S. fungiforme, the bract is tightly pressed against the flowers. In the 1990s, it was suggested that the pollinators of S. fungiforme could be possums—marsupial mammals found in South, Central, and North America. Their opposable thumb on the hind feet allows possums to easily open flowers.
This hypothesis was only recently confirmed—with the use of video cameras set up near blooming S. fungiforme.
A recent article in the journal Ecology describes the content of the video recordings (which are attached to the publication), showing possums breaking off the covering leaf and drinking nectar while simultaneously transferring pollen between flowers. After the flower is opened, other pollinators, such as bees, wasps, and even hummingbirds, join in, but the primary role in pollination still belongs to the possums.
