in nature most colorful things are venomous / poisonous, why are flowers so colorful but still harmless?
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My thoughts are, its because they are colorful for different reasons. Animals are colorful and bright to deter predators, flowers are colorful to attract, because its in flowers interest that a bird comes to it and spreads its seed.
Because they draw insects, petals are typically colorful. The delicious scent and vividly colored petals that flowers produce boost the likelihood of pollination. A crucial step in the sexual reproduction of higher plants is pollination.
Those bright colors on poisonous animals evolved to warn predators they are poisonous. There is no point in being poisonous if you still die, even if you take the predator down with you, a warning makes sense so you don’t get eaten in the first place.
Flowers are colorful because their entire job is to attract pollinators to help the plant reproduce.
In both cases color is used to distinguish themselves from other things.
Bright colors are messages. There are several reasons why an organizims sends messages. 1. Go away, i am poisonous or toxic. 2. Mate with me. 3. I have something you want. 4. I am ready to eat. Flower are number 3.
Most brightly colored *animals* are poisonous, but not plants. There are very different selective pressures here.
In animals, bright colors are a form of [aposematism,](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aposematism) or making itself conspicuous to predators as a warning that it is not safe to eat. Even that is not true in all cases; birds are often brightly colored but they are not poisonous.
In plants, bright colors are usually attractive signals to pollinators, like insects, birds, and bats.
They are all colorful for the same adaptive reason: to be noticable. Dangerous things stand out so they won’t be attacked/eaten (because other creatures are genetically or conditionally programmed to avoid them) and flowers stand out so they will be visited by pollinators (because they can be recognized as sources of nectar through the same mechanisms). It is the same adaptive advantage (obvious and distinctive visual cue), just used in different ways.
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