- Kenya to bioprospect?
- Plant idioms explored.
- Be evil. Save seeds and spread them around.
- Get ready for the London Potato Fair 25th January. Via.
- GRAIN positive that Nerica is bad for Africa.
- Shinier cropland to cool the planet? More from the author.
- Profiting from fish by not fishing is illegal?
Yes we have orange bananas
We’ve nibbled the new New Agriculturist but not highlighted specifically, I think, the fact that it has a special on bananas. And African bananas in particular. Coincidentally, there’s a paper out in Food Chemistry on genetic variability in carotenoid content within Musa .
Nibbles: Journal, Biofuel source, Old seeds, Bees, Aquaculture, Millennium Seed Bank, Pests, Earthworms, Jellyfish, Cuba, Japan, Kerala, Queensland, Goats, Cacao, Savanna, Global maps, Nepal
- New Gene Conservation is out. Put out more flags.
- Biofuel from coffee grounds? Right. Hope the stuff was shade-grown, anyway.
- Is a lupin or date palm seed the oldest ever found? Let the controversy rage.
- Bees scare caterpillars as well as pollinating plants. Thankfully, Europe is on the job, colony-collapse-wise.
- Trouble for Scottish farmed salmon. And the wild ones may have their problems too. But aquaculture in general is booming, they say.
- Google Earth discovers forest. Not agrobiodiversity, but fun nonetheless.
- “It doesn’t just take in seeds – it sends them out.”
- Maize pest will love climate change. Well, some of them anyway.
- The latest review of earthworms discussed.
- Jellyfish and chips?
- Eating local pretty much unavoidable in Cuba. Yes, everyone wants to be a locavore these days.
- Japanese amateur botanists get into genebanking.
- “108 dishes based on jackfruit and seed varieties that are facing extinction were also exhibited at the festival.” 108?
- Queensland markets its tropical produce via a new website. No reason why others shouldn’t do the same, is there?
- “People shouldn’t underestimate how important a goat can be for a family in Africa.” Having had to assist in slaughtering one over Christmas, I certainly don’t.
- A rapid run-through the history of chocolate.
- Long-fallow agriculture in Mali leads to more, more diverse and taller trees.
- Global accessibility map published. Also one of fires, and intact forests. Let a thousand agrobiodiversity mash-ups bloom. Thanks, Andy.
- Nepal has lots of medicinal plants. Funny they don’t seem to feature in the Western Terai Landscape Complex Project.
El hombre de la papa
Here is a video about the life and work of Carlos Ochoa, the recently deceased potato man. By the Televisión Nacional del Perú, in Spanish. From his early days in Cusco, resisting a father that wanted him to become a lawyer, to the agony of an approaching end, with so much of his life’s work unfinished. Watch, listen, admire, and shiver.
Nibbles: Frogs, Noni, Cassava etc, Commons, Starch, Aurochs, Oats
- Frog porridge.
- Noni in excruciating depth.
- Caribbean seeks food security, turns to “cassava, sweet potato, bananas, yams and many others”.
- Uncommonly interesting article on commons.
- Nice summary of the amylase-gene-copy-number-and-starch-in-the-diet story.
- Dutch aurochs survived longer than thought.
- Yes, we have no oats.