Coextinction models are useful to understand community robustness to species loss and resilience
to disturbances. We simulated pollinator extinctions in pollination networks by using a hybrid model
that combined a recently developed stochastic coextinction model (SCM) for plant extinctions and
a topological model (TCM) for animal extinctions. Our model accounted for variation in interaction
strengths and included empirical estimates of plant dependence on pollinators to set seeds. The
stochastic nature of such model allowed us determining plant survival to single (and multiple) extinction
events, and identifying which pollinators (keystone species) were more likely to trigger secondary
extinctions. Consistently across three different pollinator removal sequences, plant robustness was
lower than in a pure TCM, and plant survival was more determined by dependence on the mutualism
than by interaction strength. As expected, highly connected and dependent plants were the most
sensitive to pollinator loss and collapsed faster in extinction cascades. We predict that the relationship
between dependence and plant connectivity is crucial to determine network robustness to interaction
loss. Finally, we showed that honeybees and several beetles were keystone species in our communities.
This information is of great value to foresee consequences of pollinator losses facing current global
change and to identify target species for effective conservation., This study was performed within project CGL2013-44386-P financed to AT by the Spanish Ministry of Economy and Competitiveness., Peer reviewed