Archaeology

April 11, 2013April 11, 2013

Nibbles: Wine and climate change, Botanic gardens video, Forest restoration video, Deforestation live, European breeders meet, Yams and gender and insurance, N, Fish pots, Ancient ag books, Bioinformatics training, Sustinable ag

Blogging machine Tom Barnett worried about effect of climate change on his favourite tipple.
BGCI shell out for cool animation on social role of botanic gardens, and it’s totally worth it.
As also, but differently, are IUCN’s videos on forest restoration.
All the world’s forests, online, any day now, to monitor the opposite of their restoration.
Europe tries to stimulate innovation in plant breeding. By holding a meeting. Ah, but there’s a hashtag.
Development economists illustrate interesting point about gender and yam cultivation with photo of sweet potatoes.
The organic attitude to inorganic nitrogen.
Late Pleistocene hunter-gatherers ate fish. Well I never.
Reviews of couple books on agricultural origins.
Need bioinformatics training? Who doesn’t.
ICRAF reviews efforts to monitor sustainable intensification. Somewhere. I can’t for the life of me find the actual document.

April 10, 2013April 10, 2013

The grapevines of Pompeii

Sign explaining the story behind a vineyard planted in the ruins of Pompeii — Sign explaining the story behind one of several vineyards planted among the ruins of Pompeii

Although I knew that grapevines were cultivated in Roman times in and around Pompeii, I had no idea, until I visited the place for the first time in decades last week, that they’re there again, and in force. Various varieties apparently dating back to the time of the eruption that destroyed the city in AD 79 were planted in the late 1990s, more or less where they were originally grown.

According to Mastroberardino, wine played a central role in the lives of the Vesuvian people. Archaeological excavations, botanical studies, and the discovery of casts of vine roots and their support stakes have confirmed that vines were grown within ancient Pompeii’s city walls, in the gardens and orchards which beautified villas, and especially in the quarters located on the outskirts of the city, near the amphitheatre.

And they seem to be doing very well, though you perhaps wouldn’t know it from my photos taken in early April. Fortunately, the internet can help with that.

April 8, 2013April 8, 2013

Nibbles: Botanic gardens & forest foods, Militants against IRRI, Modern ancient farm, Conservation software, Urban mowing sheep, Agro-ecology, Beans, Value of genebanks, Seed savers, Video

Botanic gardens get into the restoration business. So that people can again eat nutritious forest foods. No, really, even the BBC says so.
Militant Filipino NGOs target IRRI. Not for the first time. And probably not the last.
Anyone planning to go to the Beltain at Butser Ancient Farm? Only a month to go…
You are probably already using at least one of these.
Paris looking to go all sheepish.
I don’t know about you, but I immediately turn off when somebody says that X is the only answer to Y. Even when the X is agro-ecology.
Même s’ils le disent en français.
Chinese “board beans” are actually lablab shock.
You going to spend an evening at The Genome Analysis Centre discussing the value of genebanks? Tell us about it!
Dutch seed savers looking to get organized.
New York times goes overboard for Digital Green participatory video.

April 3, 2013April 3, 2013

Nibbles: Property rights, Dryland crops, New tomato, CGIAR genebanks, Quinoa in US, Wasps and figs, Ancient New World agriculture, Allium CWR, SADC seed law, ESA, Coconut pollination

Why tenure matters. And why it doesn’t.
Book on alternative crops for dry areas. Not that alternative, settle down. And anyway, how do they do in mixtures?
And the award for Best New Variety of the Year goes to…
CGIAR Consortium hires private sector biotech expert to oversee genebanks et al.
US set to grow more quinoa. Shame on you, taking the bread out of the mouths of Andean peasants!
Save our figs!
Malanga and cassava important on Mayan menu. And maize maybe not so much on Pueblan one as thought.
New onion wild relative spotted in Central Asia.
GRAIN objects to new one-size-fits-all SADC seed law.
Ecological Society of America discovers agriculture.
Indian institute trains first female coconut pollinators.

April 2, 2013April 2, 2013

Brainfood: Farming systems, Connectivity, Neolithic China, Paleolithic China, Wheat genomes, Litter domestication, Arabian relatives, Pepper composition, GMOs vs agrobiodiversity

Using biodiversity to link agricultural productivity with environmental quality: Results from three field experiments in Iowa. Diversify any way you can. Even in Iowa.
Improving conservation planning for semi-natural grasslands: Integrating connectivity into agri-environment schemes. Connect any way you can. Even in Europe.
Early millet use in northern China. Very early. Starch grains push broomcorn millet use in China back 1,000 years, and foxtail millet 2,000.
Paleolithic human exploitation of plant foods during the last glacial maximum in North China. And ten thousand years before millets, there were wild grasses, roots, tubers and gourds.
Draft genome of the wheat A-genome progenitor Triticum urartu. Can be used to find agronomically important genes. But settle down, it’s only one of the 3 wheat genomes, after all.
Aegilops tauschii draft genome sequence reveals a gene repertoire for wheat adaptation. Not so fast, here comes the D genome too…
Side-effects of plant domestication: ecosystem impacts of changes in litter quality. Domestication led to higher quality, more easily decomposed litter.
Crop wild relatives from the Arabian Peninsula. 400 of them.
Compositional Characterization of Native Peruvian Chili Peppers (Capsicum spp.). There’s much variation, but not that much.
Feeding the world: genetically modified crops versus agricultural biodiversity. Guess which one is drinking the other’s milkshake. And a similar blast from the past.