- Population structure and diversity in cultivated and wild Luffa species. Luffa hermaphrodita is the closest wild species.
- Factors Enhancing Landrace in Situ Conservation in Home Gardens and Fields in Vall de Gósol, Catalan Pyrenees, Iberian Peninsula. It’s not just about landrace performance.
- Sorghum Genetic Resources: Conservation and Diversity Assessment for Enhanced Utilization in Sorghum Improvement. 236,000 accessions, 38,000 at ICRISAT alone, of which 3 have proved useful. Wait, what?
- Genetic Diversity in Eucalypts. It’s high, and needs to be used.
- Explaining the decrease in the genetic diversity of wheat in France over the 20th century. Because breeding.
- Animal-breeding schemes using genomic information need breeding plans designed to maximise long-term genetic gains. You can’t just wing it.
- Remaining natural vegetation in the global biodiversity hotspots. 15%, and fragmented.
- Targeting Global Protected Area Expansion for Imperiled Biodiversity. Increasing protected area coverage to Aichi targets would do little to achieve threatened species coverage in situ, at least for vertebrates.
- Phenotypic evaluation and characterization of a collection of Malus species. German apple collection characterized the old school way, and none the worse for that.
Nibbles: Sorghum research, Alternative millet, IRRI genebank genomics, Cattle genomes, CIAT genebank, Rainforest genebank, Saving seeds, Millet in India, Varied diets, Cheese rind microbes, Fermentation, Artisanal hooch, Truffle oil, Coconut water, Fancy carrots, Edible insects, Farming tuna, Saving cetaceans, Fancy tomato database
- What must be done about sorghum in Africa, by someone who should know because they worked at ICRISAT, which has a sorghum genebank.
- ICRISAT also has pearl millet genebanks — in India and Africa. So when did pearl millet become “alternative” in India? Well, at least it’s not on this list of “indigenous foods.”
- 3000 rice genomes (from the IRRI genebank), and 1000 bull genomes. Brave new world.
- The CIAT genebank makes the news, and not a genome in sight.
- An in situ forest genebank deep in the heart of Sabah.
- And you can bet they’re all saving seeds the right way. But there’s always a webinar if not. Or this.
- Micronutrients? It’s the food system, stupid. Yes, indeedy. And there’s even a webinar about it.
- The fascinating microbial system of cheese rinds.
- Sauerkraut has a pretty fascinating microbial system too, I bet.
- Artisanal whiskey is a thing? Isn’t it, basically, moonshine?
- Truffle oil is a scam. Damn.
- Coconut water tries not to seem a scam.
- Heifer Farm shows off its weird carrots. Yeah, they’re more than just about livestock at Heifer.
- Though that doesn’t include insects, I don’t think. Yes, insects.
- Or bluefin tuna. Or the vaquita. But enough of that.
- Plenty of weird tomatoes on this great wiki I came across.
Brainfood: Agricultural anthropology special edition, Breeding gourami, FGR indicators, Solanum phenomics, Organic aphids, Restoration genetics, Wild Vigna, Genebanks & genomics
- Tending the Field: Special Issue on Agricultural Anthropology and Robert E. Rhoades. Agrobiodiversity conservation, participatory and collaborative research, and the politics of agricultural development.
- Genetic Diversity of Siamese Gourami from Sumatra, Java and Kalimantan for Selective Breeding of Fish Culture. Yeah, but does it taste nice? Time for some fishicultural anthropology, methinks.
- Global to local genetic diversity indicators of evolutionary potential in tree species within and outside forests. You can’t use indirect indicators of pressure, benefit or response independently of state indicators for genetic diversity. Anyway, here’s a bunch of all of those for you to ponder.
- Conventional and phenomics characterization provides insight into the diversity and relationships of hypervariable scarlet (Solanum aethiopicum L.) and gboma (S. macrocarpon L.) eggplant complexes. High-throughput phenotyping platform built for tomatoes distinguishes between really variable complexes of other solanaceous berries.
- Organic vs. conventional farming dichotomy: Does it make sense for natural enemies? Yes.
- Genes are not information: Rendering plant genetic resources untradeable through genetic restoration practices. Decommodify to commodify. No, really.
- Prioritising in situ conservation of crop resources: A case study of African cowpea (Vigna unguiculata). 9 of 13 priority wild cowpea taxa are likely to be found in protected areas.
- Genebanks and genomics: how to interconnect data from both communities? Beyond databases.
Nibbles: Prof. Mithen, Commons, Park Grass, Maize genome dupe, Training breeders, Insect-eating fungi, Shea, Teff breeding, Cannabis genome, Organic study, Old sunflower domestication, Rick’s tomatoes
- Developer of super broccoli reflects on his career. With photo of collectors in NSFW shorts.
- Touring the commons of the world. Thankfully no tight shorts in sight.
- Video explaining Rothamsted’s Park Grass experiment. Apparel entirely acceptable, don’t worry.
- Ten million-year-old genome duplication finally came good when ancient farmers domesticated maize.
- Training materials for African breeders to be developed.
- Fungal diversity to the rescue of plants, for a change.
- Africa’s black soap.
- Improving teff. That’s a low bar, I suspect.
- A genome I’m sure we can all get behind.
- Oh dear, that organic meta-analysis “flawed” after all. Will it ever end?
- Rethinking sunflower domestication. An oldie but goldie, which re-surfaced today for some reason. Does anyone know where we are with this now?
- The Deliverance of tomatoes.
Nibbles: Coffee processing, British liquorice, Livestock maps, Chicken semen, Global Nutrition Report, Plant booze, Cuban urban ag, Forests & nutrition, Sustainable cacao, Climate-smart ag, Modelling landuse, Mapuche up in arms, Rothamstead experiment
- Touring the world’s coffee processors.
- Liquorice next? Starting in the UK?
- India has 30% of the world’s cattle. Which you might not be able to guess from these very cool ILRI maps. Including one on chickens, in which the Nordic countries feature perhaps less than they should.
- The Global Nutrition Report will have these indicators at country level. Some stuff there on fruit and vegetable consumption, but why nothing specifically on dietary diversity? Anyway, if you’d like to make suggestions, you can.
- Wait, why is there nothing on alcohol consumption? And is diversity in alcohol-producing plants a good thing? I mean, nutrition-wise.
- Uhm, nothing on urban agriculture either. I bet you that’s an indicator of something or other, nutrition-wise.
- Maybe Amy Ickowitz of CIFOR will suggest some indicators. She has interesting data on forest cover and child nutrition.
- How to make cacao cultivation more sustainable.
- Andy Jarvis on how to scale up climate-smart agriculture without necessarily sacrificing goats. Nor, presumably, nutrition.
- Model says environment can support subsistence hunting and agriculture only up to a point, and no more. Still no cure for cancer. But did someone tell the Mapuche?
- Well, what do you know, genes come, and genes go.