WWF recommends how salmon farming and beautiful Chilean lakes can co-exist.
Eat locally, profit globally
The celebrity chef who decides to source everything locally has become a bit of a stereotype among foodies the world over. Here’s one whose local is the continent of Australia. Actually, Vic Cherikoff is no newcomer to the game, and this Q&A recounts his long fascination with bush tucker and, increasingly, bush medicine.
Climate change and agriculture
A press release from the Smithsonian Institute draws attention to a study that links climate change, culture and agriculture. Mexico’s Central Balsas Valley is believed to be one of the sites where farmers domesticated maize and squashes. The new data suggest that the climate in the valley became cooler and drier at the end of the most recent ice age. Lakes in the valley formed at around that time and became magnets for human settlements, which contain evidence of maize and squash pollen. Of course, we’re not saying that climate change is always a good thing …
Agave paper
There’s a paper out on the diversity of Agave in Mexico, the source of tequila.
European aurochs DNA in domestic cattle
A study ((Edwards CJ et al., 2007. Mitochondrial DNA analysis shows a Near Eastern Neolithic origin for domestic cattle and no indication of domestication of European aurochs. Proceedings Royal Society B 274:1377-1385)) just published by the Royal Society sheds some light on the genetic relationship between the European auroch and modern European cattle breeds. Cattle were initially domesticated perhaps around 10,000 years ago in Mesopotamia, and independently in India and probably Africa. As animal agriculture spread into Europe from the Middle East, domesticated cattle must have coexisted with wild European aurochs for some time, since aurochs in Europe didn’t die out until much later (in fact, the last aurochs appear to have lived in Poland around 1627). Analysis of contemporary as well as ancient mitochondrial DNA from Middle Eastern and Central European archaeological sites now seems to suggest that European cattle originated solely from Middle Eastern aurochs, and that no introgression of European auroch genes into domesticated cattle occurred during their long coexistence.
However, an earlier study ((Götherström A et al., 2005. Cattle domestication in the Near East was followed by hybridization with aurochs bulls in Europe. Proceedings Royal Society B 272:2345-2350)) did show that there had indeed been introgression of auroch Y chromosomes into Northern and Central European domestic cattle and that these Y chromosome markers still exist in some European breeds. Of course, what might seem contradictory really isn’t: mitochondria are strictly inherited from one’s mother, and the mating of domestic cows with auroch bulls wouldn’t have left any mitochondrial evidence. It would be interesting to know whether such hybridization occurred surreptitiously or intentionally, which of course would suggest that early framers knew something about the benefits of cross-breeding.
From H. Michael Kubisch.