Author: Jeremy Cherfas

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Berry Go Round Number 58

Hosting Berry Go Round needn’t be an ordeal. But if it is, I’m encouraged by one particular submission.

Exhibit A: The Mystery of the Killer Bean

If eaten with confidence (as in the case of someone convinced of their innocence), the high concentration of toxins would cause the stomach to reject the bean, and a life-saving vomit would occur.  If someone was nervous, and stalled the consumption with small bites or delayed swallowing, the toxin would have more time to be absorbed into the bloodstream, and death would thus occur.

E. Green’s story about the Calabar Bean (Physostigma venenosum) suggests that the best way to get through this trial is just to plough straight on and do it. So here we go.

I don’t much mind people linking to their older posts, but I draw a kind of line for a year-old obituary of someone who had died five years previously, no matter how important the subject really was. ((C’mon Mike, you can do better.))

Exhibit B: Is everybody happy?

Amongst that botanically inclined group, 87% agreed they were happy, and 89% cited doing something ‘worthwhile and useful’ as contributing to that high degree of happiness. ‘Scientists and Researchers’ were only 69% happy (presumably because it was zoologists, physicists, chemists – i.e. non-botanists – who were interviewed…?). And the least-happy group (i.e. most down-in-the-mouth, miserable lot)? Bankers(!) – and which fact has been seized upon as proof that there is in fact a supreme deity ‘out/up there’ who is looking after us all down here… – who are only 44% happy: ‘Result!’ (said a Herr Scha den Freude, ‘diminutive garden denizen’ of Zurich).

Nigel Chaffey at the AoB Blog provides our rallying cry this month. Plant people are just happier than everyone else. So who is going to repeat the survey elsewhere?

Exhibit C: How to make some botanists even happier

A discovery like this makes you wonder where you’ve been all your life—how could such a thing be novel after so many decades of botanical exploration? I needed to find out what this tasted like, and as the post was not merely a description but an invitation to experimentation, my course was set. I rounded up some likely suspects—herbs as well as friends—and we assembled the fixings by a “bring your own…” process

Sally and her friends at Foothills Fancy go all Carthusian in their attempt to recreate chartreuse, and it seems to have worked. You’ll find full details of the botany and the process, though not much about the taste itself.

Exhibit D: By Jove, mushroom magic:

Can you imagine farms where man-made lightning bolts strike the ground and induce large flushes of mushrooms? Well, this is what scientists in Japan are doing. … No, it isn’t exactly like lightning—it’s more like the shock you get from a metal doorknob after dancing in your polyester leisure suit.

Who told her about my polyester leisure suit? I’m linking to the version that was submitted at the Cornell Mushroom Blog, rather that to Miwa Oseki Robbins’ own blog, not least because there’s some spam in the comments there that would worry me.

Exhibit E: Joshua tree complications

Most insect pollinators transfer pollen more or less inadvertently: they accidentally collect pollen on their bodies as they visit a flower for one reason or another, and then they accidentally leave some of it in the next flower they visit. Yucca moths’ behavior, by contrast, is volitional — assuming we can ascribe volition to an organism with the approximate mentative power of a keychain LED torch.

Chris Clarke, at Pharyngula, adopts a thoroughly speciesist point of view towards another creature’s mental abilities, but I forgive him for his lucid explanation of just what’s happening to the Joshua Trees out there just north of Area 51 in the Mojave Desert.

Exhibit F: Cormospheres and the blogosphere

[A]s a words lover, I was delighted to read a whole bunch of spherical words in a paper recently: cormosphere, caulosphere, calusphere, phyllosphere, anthosphere, and carposphere (and let’s add spermosphere).

BGR’s onlie begetter Laurent has got balls on the brain, and uses his love for words to investigate these “special places of biological interactions, usually between plants and microbes,” or at any rate their popularity in scholarly articles.

Exhibit G: How to grow a picture-book woodland tree

To grow a picture-book woodland tree – with a deep wide crown, short fat trunk, and thick low branches – you need space, time, and more time again. Like good Slow Food, the recipe is simple but can’t be rushed. You just can’t skimp on space nor time.

Ian Lunt takes the time and space to explain just how a beautiful, welcoming, climbable tree comes about, and a fine recipe it is too.

Exhibit H: World’s smallest flower

In parts of Asia the plant is used as a food source. Being about 20% protein and 40% starch, it is a great addition to the diet in some developing countries. Laos and Thailand are two of the biggest Wolffia harvesters. It is grown on still water surfaces as a floating mat of the tiny flowers and harvested as often as every 2 weeks. … Walking by a pond with a thin layer of green film on the surface doesn’t quite stimulate the appetite the way an apple orchard or greenhouse full of tomatoes might.

Amen to that, and another student contribution to Alien Plantation. If only Jonathan Heinz had told us what duckweed tastes like. “Sweet cabbage,” apparently.

Exhibit I: New plants taxonomised

[T]he single October-December issue of Systematic Botany had 14 new species in it, alone – in addition to the most popular botany story of the year, a new genus of ferns called Gaga (named, of course, for Lady Gaga). … We also found new things from right under our noses: like a new crocus in Turkey, a carnation in Russia, or the new Monstera from Honduras that was already commonly used by locals to weave into hats. In 2012, we even found three new species of dandelion (two from Italy and one from Scotland).

I fantasise about the botany bloggers of the future writing little historical squibs about Gaga, much as I might do today about Rudbeckia or Siegesbeckia.

Exhibit J: Midwinter botanizing in Wyoming.

Our word for the day is anemochory, meaning seed dispersal by wind.

Hollis takes a walk through the snow and finds many plumed seeds ready to rush off in search of somewhere good to grow.

Exhibit K: A plant grows in Bratislava

Able to reproduce without pollination, adept at dispersal, prepared to colonize the tiniest bit of open habitat – it’s no wonder dandelions have done so well.  And their growing season is long.  They are among the first flowers of spring and the last in fall.

Why Bratislava? Well, why not. Dandelions are ubiquitous, but that doesn’t stop Hollis appreciating their finer points, including their anemochory.

Exhibit L: Bees and pesticides

Neonicotinoids are now one of the most broadly used class of insecticides, to the extent that a recent report suggests a ban on neonicotinoid seed treatments could reduce yields of key crops by 20% and cost the EU economy as much as €4.5 billion per year.

Plantwise from CABI treads a careful line through the recent study, which got a lot of press elsewhere. Big question: how does the cost of not using neonicotinoids compare with the cost of not having bees?

Exhibit M: Expensive evergreen leaves

[S]alal exports from southern Vancouver Island alone generated $6–10 million dollars in export revenue, and professional salal gatherers can earn a competitive living wage.

Gaultheria shallon is one of those do-it-all plants for the people of the Pacific Northwest, although for Thomas M., another student contributor to Alien Plantations, its appeal seems to lie in its potential to pay back his student loan.

Exhibit N: Seedlings emerging safely

Many testicles, for instances rocks or heavy soil, may get in the way of the seedling as is venture up into the world. The main stem of a plant is called the shoot apical meristem, in the beginning stages damage to the shoot apical meristem would mean dead to the plant.

Honestly, the main reason I’m linking to this one is that Cupertino in the second word of the extract. Took me a while to figure out, and having done so, I’m happy (See Exhibit B) to share. Also, it leads perfectly to …

Exhibit Oh!: Banter about curcurbits

I defer to Prof. Beard on Greek footwear and Roman sex toys, but I’m not so sure about that cucumber.

Our very own Luigi is unwilling to let a misidentified curcurbit slip, and rises to the challenge of correcting Professor Mary Beard’s misapprehension. Alas, despite his entreaties and repeated requests via all the channels he can muster, the good professor has not seen fit to respond.

And that’s it, for now. I’ve vomited forth loads of goodies, without being poisoned by lingering too long over any of them. I urge you to do differently: chew them over, digest them, and respond. I guarantee no ill effects.

February’s Berry Go Round will be hosted by Sally at Foothills Fancy. I wonder whether she’s ready to try mimicking the local liqueur called Centerbe? That knocks her 62 species into a cocked hat.

Now, why not consider submitting to, or even hosting, the next Berry go Round?

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Brainfood: Peanuts, CC and biodiversity data, Climate change and vegetables, Biodiversity indicators, Lettuce diversity, Brazilian intensification, Brazilian natural products, English organic, Bolivian traditions, Protecting sea cucumbers, Urban meadows, Crop expansion, Chinese forests, Peach palm, Ancient RNA, Sweet potato movement, Date conservation

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Nibbles: Scorzonera, Pests and diseases, Deforestation, Yaks, Journal

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Does IPBES care about biodiversity and ecosystem services and agriculture?

This week the Intergovernmental Platform on Bioversity and Ecosystem Services — IPBES to its friends ((If it has any.)) — has been enjoying its first plenary meeting in Bonn, of all places. You can read the dailies here, but you won’t learn much.

You can also read things by other people present. I was touched by a blog post from Guy Pe’er, representing the Europe Section of the Society for Conservation Biology ((Of which I am a member.)) He wrote about the “stakeholder day” held last Sunday to agree their position on certain things, and among the poignant items on which the stakeholders agreed was this gem.

We are not “lobbyists”: we hold knowledge and inputs without which IPBES may fail, and they need to do a bit more to include this “we” into both structure and processes, rather than just “observe” processes or “be welcome” to make suggestions.

I don’t doubt it. I wonder, though, to what extent either the IPBES or the stakeholders represent agriculture. So far, in three days of meeting the word “agriculture” has appeared only once in those dailies, and that as the name of a organisation of the UN. Searching for “IPBES AND agriculture” doesn’t hold out much hope.

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Quinoa: it’s still really complicated, and nobody cares about it in December

Google Trends does not yet reveal the hue and cry unleashed by Joanna Blythman’s Guardian article Can vegans stomach the unpalatable truth about quinoa? and I have no idea how to create graphs for the more rapidly decaying social sites. But hue and cry there has certainly been, with people using the original article as a mounting block for their favourite hobby horse. ((We’ve been on the story, in depth, for a good long while too.))

Me too. And my hobby horse, if you’ve been reading along, is about getting things as right as you can. So, here we go again.

Joanna Blythman’s article appeared online (only?) in the Guardian’s Comment is Free section. ((I’m not honestly sure what the status of that section is, as regards the Guardian’s normal journalistic standards. It seems at first glance to be a giant free for all, although there is quite a large editorial team responsible. Do they check content? Are subs writing headlines? It would help a bit to know, simply because I get the impression that many of the reactions to the piece got no further than the headline before either attacking or defending vegans. Blythman mentions vegans only three times, so I’m going to ignore them for the red flavoured tofu that they are.)) So what’s the story? The Blythman piece appeared two days after an article in what I would call The Guardian proper, Quinoa brings riches to the Andes. Dan Collyns’ story was filed from La Paz in Bolivia. Collyns seems to be a stringer, a freelance journalist who writes for different outlets, and his article, which appears to be based on quite a few conversations, raises many of the same points as Blythman’s. Was Blythman’s article prompted by Collyns’? I don’t know. She doesn’t say. Maybe it doesn’t matter.

What does matter, to me, is the accuracy of some of the claims. Take this:

Three years ago, the pioneering Fife Diet, Europe’s biggest local food-eating project, sowed an experimental crop of quinoa. It failed, and the experiment has not been repeated. But the attempt at least recognised the need to strengthen our own food security by lessening our reliance on imported foods, and looking first and foremost to what can be grown, or reared, on our doorstep.

Luckily Fife Diet itself remembers the trial.

This isn’t true.
Our trials were a success, we examined which varieties and what soil conditions worked best.
We planted four varieties: Rainbow, Chilean, Temuco and Kaslala in one acre in northern Fife.
Temuco quinoa was by far the most productive of the four varieties with big heavy seedheads by the end of the season.  Chilean came second and Rainbow and Kaslala a joint third. With early planting and a decent season quinoa can grow fine here in Scotland and we imagine through much of the UK.

I can confirm that. Several quinoa varieties did brilliantly for me in Somerset.

Then there are all the micro- and macro-economic questions about the price of quinoa in Bolivia and Peru, the prices obtained by farmers, and the affordability of the stuff. Marc Bellemare raised most of them in his blog post Quinoa Nonsense, or Why the World Still Needs Agricultural Economists. And he got some answers, most notably from Sergio Nunez De Arco, General Manager of Andean Naturals. He too has his own row to hoe, taking care of business and those 4500 Bolivian and Peruvian farm families he buys from. ((As an aside, can you really trademark an entire type of quinoa, as Andean Naturals has for Royal Quinoa®? The specification sheet says nothing about this product that a geneticist or gene banker could use. Does that mean we could sell the same seeds, as long as we don’t call them by the same name, rather like some of the “village” wines from fine vineyards?))

A lot is made about nutrition, mostly about what a wonderfully nutritious food quinoa is, especially for those who choose not to eat meat. But little has been said about quinoa growers, who would probably eat more meat if they could afford to, but who currently eat quinoa. Most of the commentary has focused on the price of quinoa in the shops, without relating that to the people who grow it. Bellemare asked “Are most households in the Altiplano net buyers or net sellers of quinoa, or are they autarkic relative to it?” ((I added the link; not sure why the term is preferred to self-sufficient, but there must be a reason.)) Sergio at Andean Naturals answered:

The altiplano is huge and not al who live there are quinoa farmers. Why is everyone not planting quinoa? Because there simply is not an unlimited demand for it. There’s plenty of quinoa produced, and it’s not so easy finding a market. Farmers who plant quinoa are net sellers. Herders are net buyers. Assessing the financial welfare impact in the quinoa production areas is easy: tracking average income per family farm. It went up from $35 to $220 per family per month in the past 5 years. ((Citation needed?))

But what neither mention, although a successful quinoa grower in Ireland alludes to it, is the labour and drudgery of turning quinoa into food. It’s a bugger, requiring about 6 painful hours to process 12 kg. So if someone comes along and offers you cash money for quinoa, you might well be tempted to sell all you can grow – leaving more time to grow more quinoa – and buy convenient food instead. Which is what farmers are doing, resulting in malnutrition among children and adults. A machine that cuts processing time from 6 hours to 7 minutes has been developed, as have new ways of using quinoa, and these are beginning to improve the lives of quinoa-growing families.

The whole business of locally-important foods finding an export market – or even a bigger internal market – is fraught with problems and nuances of interpretation. There really are no simple stories, like meat vs quinoa.

What about quinoa diversity? If the market prefers just a few varieties, will farmers abandon the diversity that underwrites the future of the crop? How do you use markets to counter that?

What about the sustainability of the fragile ecosystems in which quinoa thrives? As demand grows, farmers have responded by boosting production in ways that, like nutrition, are good for them in the short term but are utterly unsustainable.

What about outsiders leaping on the quinoa bandwagon, as Sergio worried.

Sadly with all the negative press around quinoa there is an increasing incentive for mass-cultivated, hybrid quinoa production. These companies will provide an increasing supply of quinoa against which small farmers will have a tough time competing.

The solution, of course, is to be a bit more thoughtful about your food purchases, wherever you are. Fife Diet puts it well.

The answer we’d suggest to the quinoa conundrum (as in most food issues) is: if we want to eat it we should grow it ourselves or import it via fair trade.

A final thought. Much of the excitement around quinoa is the result of 2013 being the International Year of Quinoa (not that you would know it from the official website). Is it too much to hope that even now, publishers are readying for print a book that might do for the chenopodiaceous pseudograin what John Reader’s Propitious Esculent did for the potato in its year, 2008?