- The quest for Big Mike. No, not Stormy Daniels’ latest. It’s a banana.
- Ok, I’m going to resist the temptation of making the obvious follow-up joke in connection with this gallery of beautiful chickens.
- Who needs chickens when you have pigeons. Ah, no, these are pigeonpeas.
- Australia’s answer to the potato. Unclear what the question was.
- Australia’s answer to frost-sensitive wheat: look in genebanks for resistant stuff.
- The mother of all avocados. Kind of a Hass-been, though.
- Avocado shmavocado, says India.
- Are you not entertained? Have some popcorn!
- And mustard for that hotdog. You know, like Mesolithic people did.
- History of plant collecting double feature: Bradby Blake & Frank N. Meyer.
- Listen to Jeremy on how grain made its way up the Thames.
- A lot of grain also makes its way to Ft Collins. See what I did there?
- Taro whiskey: I’ll drink to that.
- Kenyan coffee to finish things off? Maybe not for long.
Stirring up a rabbit controversy
In 600 AD…
…Pope Gregory the Great … decreed that laurices — newborn or fetal rabbits — didn’t count as meat. Christians could therefore eat them during Lent. They became a popular delicacy, and hungry monks started breeding them. Their work transformed the wild, skittish European rabbit into a tame domestic animal that tolerates humans.
Or maybe not, says Ed Yong.
In fact, “…when it comes to domestication, …when is the wrong question.” Shoot. 1
Nibbles: Ruby chocolate, Wild Cicer, Lost rices, Breeding beans, Pawpaw, Pink pineapple, Indigenous livestock, Aquaculture, Coffee Atlas, Egyptian beer, Tequila shortage, Crop diversity
Brainfood: Hari, Gian Tommasso, Cold sorghum, Introgression, Spanish olives, Soybean minerals, Lentil minerals, Durum wheat stress, Livestock guard dogs diversity, Horse diversity, Agricultural landscapes
- Hari Deo Upadhyaya: Plant Breeder, Geneticist and Genetic Resources Specialist. “A prolific writer and with immense passion for teaching, Hari Upadhyaya has established a school of his own for the management, evaluation and use of genetic resources for crop improvement.”
- The Contribution of Professor Gian Tommasso Scarascia Mugnozza to the Conservation and Sustainable Use of Biodiversity. “It is difficult to fully remember the work of Gian Tommaso Scarascia Mugnozza, a man of charismatic personality, brilliant intelligence, great culture, with an extraordinary capacity of translate his ideas and intuitions into concrete projects”
- Evaluation of sweet sorghum accessions for seedling cold tolerance using both lab and field cold germination test. Try the lab first.
- Does introgression of crop alleles into wild and weedy living populations create cryptic in situ germplasm banks? Yes. Review based on sunflower.
- Variability in Susceptibility to Anthracnose in the World Collection of Olive Cultivars of Cordoba (Spain). About a third of 308 varieties resistant, including the most widely grown, while another widely common one is very susceptible.
- Genomewide association study of ionomic traits on diverse soybean populations from germplasm collections. Didn’t even have to grow them out.
- Bio-fortification potential of global wild annual lentil core collection. This lot were grown out, and Turkey and Syria found to be particularly diverse.
- Genome-wide association analyses identify QTL hotspots for yield and component traits in durum wheat grown under yield potential, drought, and heat stress environments. On chromosomes 2A and 2B.
- Investigating the population structure and genetic differentiation of livestock guard dog breeds. Surprisingly “reasonable” levels of diversity within breeds.
- Genetic monitoring of horses in the Czech Republic: A large-scale study with a focus on the Czech autochthonous breeds. Same for these guys, though breed differentiation was not as good.
- Exploring Agricultural Heritage Landscapes: A Journey Across Terra Incognita. “… a perspective on agricultural landscapes as complex, adaptive biocultural systems has not yet been incorporated into conservation practice.”
Spreading the good news about forages
I know I Nibbled it, but I think it’s worth giving a bit more space to the tropical forages newsletter Forages for the Future, edited by Bruce Pengelly and Brigitte Maass. In Brigitte’s words: “The newsletter is meant to start re-building a community that is interested and engaged in tropical and subtropical forage genetic resources, their conservation and utilization.”
All 6 issues may be found on the website of the journal Tropical Grasslands-Forrajes Tropicales. Let us know if you want to be added to the mailing list. Because, as you’ll remember from a recent Brainfood, forages are not all bad.