Mainstream

Orto Errante at FAO

I must say I was surprised to see this, here.

Pleasantly surprised.

Everything you need to know about sunflowers, as it happens. They’re not cassava.
New York Botanical Gardens has a climate change garden. Coupla apples mentioned, no other food, not even cassava.
Cassava, “the Rambo of food crops,” will save the world. Did Rambo use silver bullets?
The Center for Global Development thinks Bill Gates is the cassava of agriculture. No, wait …
JStor Plant Biology rounds up his favourite historical food papers. Cassava absent

Modelling chestnut biogeography for American chestnut restoration. As all 7 species have very similar climatic niches, if you could get a blight-resistant hybrid, it would probably be adapted to North American conditions.
Ex situ conservation programmes in European zoological gardens: Can we afford to lose them? No, and therefore the EU needs to step in. Whoa, talk about a non sequitur.
The Fine Scale Ethnotaxa Classification of Millets in Southern India. Malayali farmers can consistently recognize more phenotypes than DNA analysis, and some of the cryptic landraces might be really useful.
Diversity of cassava (Manihot esculenta Crantz) cultivars and its management in the department of Bouenza in the Republic of Congo. High, but decreasing, at least in some villages. But overall? Any collections made?
Indigenous agroforestry in a changing context: The case of the Erumanen ne Menuvu in Southern Philippines. Despite being divinely-sanctioned, the pengegnewiran swidden system is changing, in response to socio-economic changes. It needs to, and blaming the people because you don’t like the result is not very helpful.
Variation in biochemical composition of baobab (Adansonia digitata) pulp, leaves and seeds in relation to soil types and tree provenances. Soil has a big effect. At least in Benin.
Comparing silvopastoral systems and prospects in eight regions of the world. They’re all going to need more active management.

Seven forest myths exposed. And more on the work debunking one of them. Yeah I know we already Nibbled it, get over it.
And you know what, here’s another one we already Nibbled, on collecting seeds in Central Asia. But I just read it again in the hardcopy version and it’s really cool and I like seeing people I know in funny shorts. Incidentally, the dead tree version has a link to Vaviblog that is unaccountably missing online.
Will no one buy me this fabulous banana book? (Not if you keep being rude to your reader. Ed.)
Second installment of that we-farm-because-we-like-beer thing. I’m not sure about the theory, but I like the way this guy writes. Yes, it’s a little look at me, look at me. But sometimes you need that.
Tales of the cucumber. Does anyone remember if we blogged about this paper?
More to myrrh than meets the eye. And more than most folk need to know.
Oxford boffins say a pox on both your houses: “environmentally friendly” farms better than conventional and organic.
National Geographic tackles the dog. Amazingly, all the photos are of, ahem, dogs.
What’s with all this stuff about cacao lately? Has someone sequenced another variety or something?

World Bank runs competition to develop climate change app. CCAFS surrenders.
ICRISAT launches Center of Excellence on Climate Change Research for Plant Protection. CCAFS surrenders.
Britain’s National Fruit Collection gets grafted.
COGENT looks for validation.
Everybody loves timelapse.
A seed catalogue round-up.
“True grits“. Worthy, of course, but basically I love the title.
Not sure why news of a website for the Biofortification Conference held in November 2010 just popped up, but it did.
Know any good, young, committed, practical, gung-ho, field-tempered, agricultural Norman Borlaug clones? The World Food Prize wants to hear from you.
The Millennium Seed Bank has a blog. Welcome, seed-dudes!