Protea repens nectar can be so plentiful that flowerheads may be turned down over a basin for nectar collection in “a stream of droplets”. At other times, in dry conditions or from bushes flowering in midsummer, the lower nectar volume may be quite viscous or sticky.
Be that as it may, at pollination time P. repens, the best known and very sugary among sugarbushes, are central to big social occasions of nectar feasting. The colourful flowerheads bring joy to flying and crawling residents of the fynbos, a multitude of avid nectar consumers in the shapes and sizes of very dissimilar beasties.
The Cape sugarbird is a conspicuous and well-known visitor, becomingly “with it” as photographic model and star perching conspicuously for photos, videos and general adulation. Several sunbirds also partake, as well as a myriad of insects.
The big ones include scarab beetles and protea beetles. Among the lesser ones are numerous unnamed species that the entomologists haven’t homed in on yet. The innocuous and unnoticed species not impacting human comfort, interest or economics wait longer for being named and studied.
Should untoward behaviour in terms of human interests be detected in an insect, it becomes a target for extermination. The study of their life cycles give clues as to the most economical ways of eradicating them; all in the interests of unaffected fruit and vegetable market production for human enjoyment and financial rewards.
In the meantime, all insects eat and are edible by something else bound to get hungry. The no name diners and no name dishes among living species excite weird palates in the United Nations of those consuming fellow consumables.
Insects are sometimes ingested inside flowerheads! Not all restaurants are safe. It appears as if one visitor in picture may fit the diet of another higher up in a food chain or food matrix. Not all visiting diners fancy nectar, but know where to access six-legged protein sources among the odd, crawling delicacies (Rourke, 1980; http://pza.sanbi.org).