I must admit that what I liked best about this recent post over at BoingBoing was not so much the idea of concentrating conservation efforts on animals that “have few close relatives on the tree of life and are often extremely unusual in the way they look, live and behave, as well as in their genetic make-up” — although that IS pretty cool — so much as the photo of the weird salamander. And, indeed, that there is an International Cooperation Network for Giant Salamander Conservation. But then I got to thinking about which species one would choose if one was going to do something similar for crops. What crops have few relatives and are just plain strange, for whatever reason? The artichoke? The caper? Buckwheat? The coconut? Send in your vote…
Luigi
You mentioned coconut because of its lack of relatives; there can hardly be anything strange about a plant that is such a familiar sight. Perhaps what is “strange” is that popular opinion takes so long to catch up its ideas about about this palm and its products. As you well know, coconut has had its own “International Cooperation Network for [Giant Salamander] Conservation” since COGENT was set up in 1992. Now is time to move on to the concept of a Global Coconut Research and Development Initiative – starting with “One Laptop per Coconut R&D Worker” to make the positive benefits of the internet available to the small, underprivileged, group of people who are responsible for making coconut farming viable in the 21st century. Thanks for giving me the opportunity to get that off of my chest. Anyone interested can find out more at the Coconut Google Group.
Thanks, Hugh. But you have to admit that, despite its familiarity, the coconut is a somewhat unusual fruit.
The Avocado.
I once read some short piece that noted the possible reasons for evolution of such a fruit- and the main theory that I can remember was development in adaptation to some now extinct megafauna disperser…well whoever that megafauna was, I’d like to thank it.