Syconium

Female and male flowers in each syconium mature at different times.

A fig is a type of accessory fruit called a syconium.

Inside the syconium, they pollinate the flowers, lay their eggs in some of them, and die.

Female wasps squeeze their way through the ostiole into the interior of the syconium.

The infructescence of Ficus is called a syconium.

Monoecious figs like F. aurea have both male and female flowers within the syconium.

Flowers form within a translucent receptacle, a syconium.

Female wasps enter the syconium and lay eggs in the female flowers as they mature.

After puncturing the syconium wall, the atmosphere returns to normal, the males are inactivated and the females emerge.

This is one of the few cases where more than one species of fig wasp has been raised from the same syconium.

Males cut exit holes in the outer wall of the syconium, through which the females exit the fig.

Known as a syconium, the fruit is actually an inverted inflorescence with the flowers aligning an internal cavity.

Formation of the syconium begins with the initial growth of bracts, which curve to form a receptacle.

The syconium often has a bulbous shape with a small opening (the ostiole) at the outward end used by pollinators.

The system may have developed from seed parasitism, but it itself is now parasitized by other wasps ovipositing through the syconium wall.

The edible fruit consists of the mature syconium containing numerous one-seeded fruits (druplets).

A much-investigated system is that of the fig syconium, which is a microcosm until its wall is punctured.

The complex inflorescence consists of a hollow fleshy structure called the syconium, which is lined with numerous unisexual flowers.

Some males then chew their way through the syconium wall, which allows the females to disperse after collecting pollen from the now fully developed male flowers.

The fig fruit is an enclosed inflorescence, sometimes referred to as a syconium, an urn-like structure lined on the inside with the fig's tiny flowers.

The females then fill their pollen pockets from newly-opened anthers and leave through holes in the syconium wall cut by the males, who then die.

The co-operation is understandable in evolutionary terms as the males and females in a single-female syconium are brothers and sisters.

The fertilised female wasp enters the receptive 'fig' (the syconium) through a tiny hole at the crown (the ostiole).

The newly emerged female wasps leave through the exit holes the males have cut and fly off to find a syconium in which to lay their eggs.

As with all figs, the fruit is actually an inverted inflorescence known as a syconium, with tiny flowers arising from the inner surface.