5 | CONCLUSION AND CAVEATS
We verified that reward-less seeds of achlorophyllous and
myco-heterotrophic M. humile were certainly dispersed by ants. A
part of the seeds was left in the ant nests and the other part of the
seeds could be discarded outside the nest directionally although we
could not evaluate the fate of genuine seeds but evaluated that of dummy
seeds. In future studies, we must track the fate of the genuine seeds
and investigate spatial distribution of the plants and the ant nests to
validate the directed seed dispersal of the achlorophyllous plantM. humile. An expected way of bioassay is to copy various
conditions of the forest floors and to examine the directed dispersal by
ants in detail.