There is simply no way to summarize Willie Smits‘ Ted Talk. It is a masterful description of putting the complexity in an agricultural ecosystem to work to solve the problems of humans and orang-utans. Just astonishing. And so much more intellectually satisfying than a simplified system. Luscious.
Plants for health
A couple of papers just out look at the use of plants as medicines, for both humans and livestock, in Africa. Mongabay reports on a study documenting how sacredness of trees and forests, protection of plants at burial sites, selective harvesting, secrecy and other beliefs and practices contribute to the protection of medicinal plants in Tanzania. Meanwhile, researchers at Kansas State University have put together a bibliographic database of plants used to treat complaints of livestock and pets in southern Africa: 506 herbal remedies are being used in 18 study areas against 81 symptoms. Amazingly, these data come from only 21 papers. A wide-open field, that of ethnoveterinary botany, clearly.
Nibbles: Infoflow, Apples, Urban agriculture, Veterinary medicine
- The Tracing Paper launches a twitter round-up. UK based, and food system in general, not just agrobiodiversity, and very useful.
- Old English apples in supermarkets … in three years time, DV. Via Tracing Paper (see above)
- SPIN-Farming has a new presentation you can download to promote intensive, diverse farming.
- South African wild plants as veterinary medicines.
How to get high legally in Portland, Ore.
Ayahuasca is the ethnomedicinal case study. First described scientifically in the 1950s by the pioneering ethnobotanist Richard Evans Schultes of Harvard, it is a complex phychoactive decoction used in shamanistic ritual, whose preparation epitomizes the sophisticated botanical knowledge of Amazonian Amerindians. Schultes disciple and ethnobotanical pin-up boy Wade Davis has a great TED talk about it. I bring all this up because of a short article in Portland’s Mail Tribune, of all places, “Southern Oregon’s News Source.” It seems the local chapter of the Brazil-based Church of the Holy Light of the Queen has just been allowed by the federal court to go ahead and brew up some “Daime tea,” which is another name for ayahuasca. Strictly for sacramental purposes, you understand. But I like the cut of that judge’s jib.
Nibbles: Perfume, Fish, Camel milk
- What agrobiodiversity lurks in ancient Egyptian perfume? We’ll soon know.
- Problems for aquaculture from Ireland to Vietnam. All the world’s a village.
- The whys and wherefores of camel milk.