- Giant spitting earthworms need love too.
- “…local subsidies to artisanal fisheries have also proved to contribute to the disappearance of species, as in the case of Senegal.” Oh, come on, gimme a break!
- Urban Agriculture Magazine wants your contributions on “Urban Nutrient Management“. via CFtF.
- Inbred bumblebees less successful.
- What do you geek? Interesting campaign. Well, what do you geek?
Nibbles: Eels, Learning, Taro
- Norway protects eels.
- 3d interactive training materials for beekeeping and sorghum cultivation.
- More on the Hawaiian GM taro story.
Chicks on film
Through interviews and reenactments, The Natural History of the Chicken investigates the role of the chicken in American life and tells several remarkable stories.
Via.
Nibbles: Bats and bananas, Extension, Russian animal harvests, Rice improvement, Sacred groves
Bad news from Tehran
In addition to everything else, it seems that the Turkman horse is under threat of extinction. 1 The problem seems to be interbreeding with Throughbreds, and owners unwilling to risk pure-bred Turkmen horses, which are expensive, in races where there is a risk of injury and prize money is low. According to one expert:
Iranian horses have unique features such as smartness, nobility, special physical conditions and high endurance level which cannot be observed in any of the imported horses.
Among the proposals to save the Turkmen horse are a genebank (not sure how that would work) and a breed register, which would probably require DNA testing for individuals.
One thing puzzles me. In the very restricted genetic bottleneck that resulted in the English Thoroughbred is a fine animal known as The Byerly Turk. Was it really a Turk? Wikipedia thinks not. More to the point, one can only be grateful that the English did not decry all that messy genetic pollution that gave rise to the English Thoroughbred.