Japanese like taro wine made in Palau. Hugh Johnson unavailable for comment.
Summer-grass winter-worm
We went to the opening of a new exhibit at the Bioparco di Roma called Bioversitalia last night. The exhibit was fine, although as usual agricultural biodiversity got short-changed a bit, and so was the food on offer. The introductory talk, however, was a thorough disappointment. Not at all inspiring. What the boffins on display should have talked about, perhaps, is things like Cordyceps sinensis, aka དབྱར་རྩྭ་དགུན་འབུ་, aka the “summer-grass winter-worm.”
The summer-grass winter-worm is a parasitic fungus from Tibet which attacks and takes over the bodies of moth larvae living in the soil. Livestock really like to eat the resulting worm-like mummies, which are also used in traditional medicine. They’re a really valuable commodity: what alerted me to their existence was a newspaper piece today about a fatal gun battle that exploded when neighbouring villages clashed over access to this resource.
Now, it is stories such as this one of the medicinal moth-mummifying fungus of Tibet that would really have got people excited in the Bioparco last night about the wonder and importance of biodiversity!
Orchid to be exploited
Remember the recent post about ylang ylang? Timbuktu Chronicles sent me to an oldish article from South Africa’s Mail & Guardian which lists the tree among Madagascar’s fragrant exports. But the article is really about a rare and threatened Malagasy orchid and how it will be cultivated for the French perfume industry. I hope everyone has their ABS arrangements down tight.
Adding value to coffee
Civet cat crap creates celebrated cup of coffee.
Opiate demand, meet opiate supply
A bumper harvest of a traditional, well-adapted crop for which there is a huge international market has led to the resignation of a government minister. Meanwhile, other countries — where livelihoods are, shall we say, less precarious — benefit. There’s so much irony there, it could be a case study in modernist narrative. I know I’ve said it before, but if it wasn’t tragic, it would be funny. Legalize it, already!