The study, by researchers at the University of Cambridge's Sainsbury Laboratory, also found that bees prefer larger bullseyes over smaller ones and fly 25% faster between artificial flower disks with larger bullseyes—potentially boosting efficiency for both bees and blossoms. The findings are published in Science Advances.

Patterns on the flowers of plants guide insects, like bees, to the center of the flower, where nectar and pollen await, enhancing the plant's chances of successful pollination. Despite their importance, surprisingly little is known about how these petal patterns form and how they have evolved into the vast diversity we see today, including spots, stripes, veins, and bullseyes.

Using a small hibiscus plant as a model, researchers compared closely related plants with the same flower size but three differently sized bullseye patterns featuring a dark purple center surrounded by white—H. richardsonii (small bullseye covering 4% of the flower disk), H. trionum (medium bullseye covering 16%) and a transgenic line (mutation) of H. trionum (large bullseye covering 36%).

They found that a pre-pattern is set up on the petal surface very early in the flower's formation, long before the petal shows any visible color. The petal acts like a 'paint-by-numbers' canvas, where different regions are predetermined to develop specific colors and textures long before they start looking different from one another.