It's difficult to pinpoint a single person who "discovered" pollination. The concept of pollination developed gradually through observations and experiments over centuries.

Here's a breakdown of key figures and their contributions:

* Ancient Greeks: Philosophers like Aristotle and Theophrastus observed that flowers produced seeds and were visited by insects, but they didn't understand the connection.

* 17th Century: Nehemiah Grew (English botanist) and Rudolf Jakob Camerarius (German botanist) made significant contributions by demonstrating the role of pollen in plant reproduction through careful experiments.

* 18th Century: Joseph Gottlieb Kölreuter (German botanist) conducted extensive experiments on cross-pollination and hybridization, furthering our understanding of the process.

* 19th Century: Charles Darwin and Gregor Mendel made groundbreaking discoveries about the mechanisms of pollination and inheritance, leading to the modern understanding of pollination as a vital component of plant reproduction.

Therefore, instead of a single discoverer, it's more accurate to say that pollination was gradually understood and its importance in plant reproduction was established through the work of many scientists over centuries.