- Internets all aglow today, so hang on to your hats, here we go. Drought forcing Kenyans out of maize, towards indigenous crops, wheat and rice. Wait, what?
- Making money from tree seedlings in Uganda. Including indigenous stuff. Damn you, allAfrica, why are you so good?
- ‘Turkey’ Hard Red Winter Wheat, Lake Michigan Whitefish, the Hauer Pippin Apple, and the St. Croix sheep, among others, added to Ark of Taste. Ok, I’m gonna have to see some explanation for that wheat one.
- Singing the praises of pulses. Even Virgil gets a namecheck.
- Tall Fescue for the Twenty-first Century? Seriously, who writes these titles?
- nth study on bees announced. And n+1st reports. And n+2nd called for. CABI does a bit of a roundup. Bless you.
- Declaration calls for “…the creation of democratic spaces for intercultural dialogue and the strengthening of interdependent networks of food producers and other citizens.” Interesting.
- Small scale farmers produce most of what Brazilians eat. And no doubt manage most of the country’s agrobiodiversity. And Cuba?
- Chinese aquaculture goes green? Riiiiight.
- “Earlier this year, farmers from the north who had benefitted from previous improved seedling activities by the International Institute of Tropical Agriculture (IITA) demanded for more improved seed varieties from scientists.” Oh come on, gimme a clue. What crop? Improved how?
- Medieval Bruges palace cesspit reveals dukes ate Mediterranean honey. Sybarites even then, the Belgians.
- Scientific American says IFPRI says “traditional seed varieties and livestock breeds that might provide a genetic resource to adapt to climate change are being lost.”
- Late Blight 101.
Nibbles: Future farming, Chicory, Chickens, Hungarian food museum, USDA on Facebook, Ugandan discussions, Livestock food
- Solutions for a Hungry World from PopSci: supercrops, C4 rice, remapping Africa and robots. But no agrobiodiversity.
- The symbolism of chicory.
- The backyard poultry value chain deconstructed.
- The Dobos Memorial Gastronomy Museum sounds fun.
- Join USDA Deputy Secretary Kathleen Merrigan at 3:45 pm ET on 1 October for a LIVE Facebook chat about local food systems.
- One-Village-One-Product in Uganda. I call that a hostage to fortune.
- Ndara, mathunzu and ngaa all that stand between drought-hit Kenyan livestock and starvation in Ukambani.
Perennial kales in Ecuador
Where did that come from, I asked myself, as we looked around the home garden of an agrotourist lodge near Cotacachi in Ecuador. No, not the wonderful neotropical fruits, or the fiery Brugmannsia, or the tree they called guava that looked to me like a carob; certainly a legume of some sort. ((Curse you, common names.)) Not any of the exotica that were at home here, but this thing, a brassica looking for all the world like a small tree.
To me it looked like one of the perennial kales, or even the Jersey Walking Stick Cabbage that I’ve grown in the UK and seen in Basque country and parts of Portugal. On the other side of the path was a red-leaved variety that had a much more dissected leaf, a little like Red Russian kale but again growing like a tree.
Fortunately the lady of the lodge, Dona Digna, who has every reason to be proud of the accomplishments of her community, was there with us, and even more fortunately I had the services of an expert translator. ((Thanks for everything, Marleni.)) I asked how they used it, and was told that they picked individual leaves as needed, and that now it was not good at all, much too tough. OK, well then how do you get tender leaves? In the spring, we make new plants. How?
At which Digna snapped off a branch of the red kale and said that you just plant a stem in the ground. So it never has flowers? No, never.
So it really is a perennial brassica, not one of the walking stick types, which do flower and set seed. But that’s as far as I could go in my investigation. I have no idea how long the local people have been growing it, where they first got it from, or what they think of it. But it was fun to see something truly exotic in Ecuador. And maybe it could add a datapoint to a study that revealed a high degree of duplication among perennial kale accessions.
Niche products from Bengali cows highlighted
There’s a wonderful message just in from Dr Sandip Banerjee to the DAD-Net discussion list on domestic animal diversity. After sounding the alarm for the Rumpless Fowl and various local goat breeds of Bengal, which he says require urgent conservation efforts, he has this to say about what’s happening with the cattle ((I’ve added the links.)):
…I was overwhelmed when I saw a herd of indigenous cattle being maintained at the International Society of Krishna Consiousness (ISKON) farm at Mayapur. The herd they maintain comprises of Gir, Kankrej and Sahiwal breeds. The animals are very well maintained and it was really pleasing to see the magnificent animals and their calves. They are also marketing clarified butter (ghee) prepared from the cream obtained from the native Indian cattle, Go Ark (a traditional Ayurvedic medicine developed from the urine and medicinal herbs which has been patented Number US patent-6410059, dt 25/06/02), the other products are Pachamrit (for gastric troubles) and Ghanabati (tablets of dried cow urine). These product are developed according to the traditional Ayurvedic principles and are marketed through their outlets.
I had no idea that it was possible to obtain quite this range of products from cattle. This is how Dr Banerjee signs off:
If such good activities are carried out by societies throughout India then why are the Government Farms (which are well established and staffed) fail to deliver, I can only conclude it by saying that there is lack of serious willingness to do so at all levels.
Sounds like a gauntlet being thrown down.
Nibbles: Prosopis as food, Chickpea delicacy, Livestock genetic erosion in Kashmir, Pholisma
- Making mesquite pancakes.
- The origin of hummus.
- “But militants on the one side and security forces on the other shot dead these dogs as they set off alarms at every movement. Now we are hardly left with any dogs.”
- “Sand food” is endangered, apparently.