- Can a person called Rushing really have written a book on Slow Gardening?
- Genetic Engineering vs. Breeding. No contest, really.
- Georgia peaches, rotting in the sun. Can the consequences of clamping down on immigrant labour really have been unintended?
- Tallante’s chickpea back from the brink. No, I don’t know why as species of Astragalus is called a chickpea. Is it even a CWR?
- Bacardi and its yeast. A tale of derring-do and intellectual property rights. h/t CAS-IP.
- Back40 takes aim at Solutions for a Cultivated Planet, so we don’t have to.
- UK productivity 5,263 beef sandwiches per hectare(bsp/h), compared to 2,439 bsp/h in the mid-18th century. h/t The Tracing Paper.
- Another great interactive map, this time of bacterial diversity of the worst kind.
- Cucumbers in Europe: a history. AoB blog explains all.
- The good old Maya nut to the rescue again.
Brainfood: Indian domestication, Canna domestication, Indigenous knowledge, Sunflower history, Diets and diversity, Immature grains
- Finding Plant Domestication in the Indian Subcontinent. Maybe five independent centers of domestication, but maybe not. It’s complicated.
- The Origin of Southeastern Asian Triploid Edible Canna (Canna discolor Lindl.) Revealed by Molecular Cytogenetical Study. It’s simple. C. indica var. indica and C. plurituberosa.
- Diversity of Plant Knowledge as an Adaptive Asset: A Case Study with Standing Rock Elders. You’d be amazed what they know. It’s diverse.
- Morphometric Analysis of Sunflower (Helianthus annuus L.) Achenes from Mexico and Eastern North America. It’s interesting. Size is a better descriptor than computerized shape analysis.
- A Systematic Review on the Contributions of Edible Plant and Animal Biodiversity to Human Diets. It’s lacking; there isn’t nearly as much good evidence as you might expect.
- Experimental approaches to understanding variation in grain size in Panicum miliaceum (broomcorn millet) and its relevance for interpreting archaeobotanical assemblages. It’s misleading. You need to make allowances for immature grains.
Don’t forget the open Mendeley group for the papers we link to here.
Nibbles: Map, Ice age nettles, Floral garlands, Land sparing, EU seed laws, FAO forecasts the future, Sugar, Vavilov
- Hey Luigi, wherever you are, here’s news of another map for you to pour (cold water) over.
- New Scientist on nettles that grow at the back of caves and that may be relict populations. Odd.
- Botanic Gardens Conservation International wants children to design “local” floral garlands for olympic athletes. Taking localism too far? What’s wrong with laurel?
- Journalist explores biodiversity vs food security arguments in Ecuador. It’s still complicated.
- Bifurcated Carrots is kind enough to link to the index for Replies to the Online Consultation on the review of the EU legislation on the marketing of seed and plant propagating material. Now, who’s going to do the analysis?
- FAO’s 1964 view of how agriculture would need to change in the following 20 years. Fifty years on, where are we?
- Not so sweet: the Samurais of Sugar.
- In Chicago next month? Go and see a play based on a book based on the scientists at the Vavilov Institute during the siege of Leningrad. Then write us a review?
Nibbles: Graphic agriculture, Nutrition, Climate change, Giant pumpkins, Economic development, Roman millet, Fairtrade, Jojoba and guayule
- Agriculture 101: A graphic novel. Am I the only one who thinks novels aren’t necessarily true? First installment.
- Bioversity has a bunch of factsheets on Nutritious Underutilized Species.
- Why is a cacao tree not like an ATM? Because the ATM still pays out when its hot.
- Speaking of which, big long thought piece on Food Security and Climate Change.
- Giant pumpkins; not much diversity here, except in the agronomic approaches.
- Better access to markets may threaten specialist smallholder farmers. The case of Namibia.
- Ancient Roman ate lots of C4 photosynthesiser: millet!
- Wake up and smell the lack of green coffee.
- A couple of wannabe Mexican industrial crops get some exposure.
Nice cuppa tea
The National Maritime Museum has a new gallery entitled ‘Trade Routes’ on the East India Company. There’s a couple of really nice associated videos on agrobiodiversity themes: tea and spices. No word on whether opium is in the offing.