- Don’t deny the warmest 12 consecutive months in the US.
- Don’t think you can eradicate invasive species by eating them.
- Don’t think the dustbowl was only about dust.
- Don’t rely on mobile phones or radios for agricultural extension.
- Don’t train farmers to select their own climate-smart seeds.
Prospects for fish (and other) farming
The CGIAR Research Program on Aquatic Agricultural Systems launched recently with this video of what research can do for poor families in Bangladesh, and yes, they’re big on agricultural biodiversity. All they need to do now is stop sea-levels rising …
Going, going, not gone?
My circles on GooglePlus alerted me to a report from NPR in the US, that the country’s oldest extant seed company is facing bankruptcy. The D. Landreth Seed Company has been going since 1784, and is credited with introducing the zinnia to the US and with popularising the tomato when it offered seed for the first time in 1820. Now the company is in trouble with its creditors.
That’s a great shame, the more so because it is happening in a country that, unlike some, ((And today is the deadline for signing up to a hopeless attempt to open up EU seed laws.)) does not enjoy legislation preventing the sale of specific varieties. So what about market demand? Don’t people want the seeds that D. Landreth has to offer? Could it be that the company’s website is, as one commenter suggests, not entirely up to date?
At G+ Anastasia Bodnar said “it’d be sort of sad if the company went under, but as it says in the article, it’s not like the germplasm would disappear, it’d be auctioned off”.
Well, maybe, but what guarantee is there that whoever buys it would maintain it? And if Landreth can’t make a living selling that germplasm, maybe the reason is that lots of other people have the self-same varieties and are selling them successfully.
My question is this: “how many varieties offered by Landreth are not offered by another seed company in the US or elsewhere?”
In the old days, I might have checked by looking in Seed Savers Exchange’s wonderful publication the Fruit, Nut & Berry Inventory, but I see there hasn’t been a new edition since 2001, and I can’t see the database on which it was based anywhere. Having produced a UK version myself, I know how hard it is to do this kind of information wrangling, but it is really worthwhile.
<dream>Maybe I should attempt to Kickstart that effort again. </dream>
Nibbles: Hula skirts, Livestock at Rio, Sea buckthorn, Kenyan ag-blogs
- Grass skirts not made of grass shock. Nope, they’re made from cabbage palm. Ah common names.
- Farm animals set off on the road to Rio, kinda, sorta.
- Enthusiast cracks sea buckthorn (Hippophae rhamnoides) propagation.
- The Bloggers Association of Kenya announces shortlist for Best Agriculture Blog.
Berry Go Round hits 50
While everyone else in the civilised world enjoys a May Day off, we’re still here, toiling to bring you the best of the interwebs. Today, that includes the 50th edition of Berry go Round, the carnival of botany blogging. Fittingly (and this wasn’t planned) the host this month is Laurent at Seeds Aside, who began the whole thing way back, er, 50 editions ago. Head over there for links to a great selection of words and images about all manner of botanical subjects.
Before you go, however, consider hosting an edition of Berry go Round yourself. It’s actually quite rewarding, in its own way. All months’s from July are open. And of course submissions for May are welcome at any time.