- China does a census of crop diversity for its genebank.
- Getting birds to help replant forests in early modern Japan.
- Swapping seeds in Bristol.
- The complementary roles of fortification and biofortification.
Brainfood: Spatial data, Extinction risk, Improved lentils, Lentil collection, Ohia germination, Shea genomics, Wild olive, Cacao climate refugia, Cacao sacred groves, Italian winter squash, Nigerian yams, Bambara groundnut diversity
- CropHarvest: A global dataset for crop-type classification. 90,000 datapoints all over the world, nicely labelled with what’s going on there agriculturally speaking. Let the AI rip.
- Using publicly available data to conduct rapid assessments of extinction risk. Pretty much useless, but at least now we know why. Should have used AI.
- Plot-level impacts of improved lentil varieties in Bangladesh. About 15% higher yields and gross margins, resulting in lots of savings on imports.
- Agro-Morphological Characterization of Lentil Germplasm of Indian National Genebank and Development of a Core Set for Efficient Utilization in Lentil Improvement Programs. And a core subset to boot. Unclear if any were used to breed the above.
- Variation in Germination Traits Inform Conservation Planning of Hawaiʻi’s Foundational ʻŌhiʻa Trees. Germination was lower from some populations than from others, but not because of environmental factors.
- Genomic Resources to Guide Improvement of the Shea Tree. Ok, great, but now what exactly? And no word on germination…
- Current Status of Biodiversity Assessment and Conservation of Wild Olive (Olea europaea L. subsp. europaea var. sylvestris). When can we expect something similar for shea tree?
- Extreme climate refugia: a case study of wild relatives of cacao (Theobroma cacao) in Colombia. The forest areas where wild cacao has survived the longest, and is particularly diverse, will be cut in half in 50 years. I wonder what the figures are for wild olive.
- Soil biomarkers of cacao tree cultivation in the sacred cacao groves of the northern Maya lowlands. Maybe re-introduce it? More here.
- How to save a landrace from extinction: the example of a winter squash landrace (Cucurbita maxima Duchesne) in Northern Italy (Lungavilla-Pavia). It’s great to have ‘Berrettina di Lungavilla’ back, but 7 years for one landrace? No sacred groves involved. Shea harvesters unavailable for comment.
- Collection, characterizaton, product quality evaluation, and conservation of genetic resources of yam (Dioscorea spp.) cultivars from Ekiti State, Nigeria. At least it’s more than one landrace.
- Genetic Diversity and Environmental Influence on Growth and Yield Parameters of Bambara Groundnut. 95 landraces, no less. All safe from extinction. Right?
Nibbles: Wild coffee, Humble potato, Banana seeds video, Citizen Bean, Svalbard, Microlivestock, Transhumance, Exotic tea, BIPOC heirlooms
- The Food Programme does coffee wild relatives.
- Potatoes are not that bad nutritionally.
- Getting banana seeds.
- Want to do citizen science with beans?
- The latest from Svalbard.
- Bugs again?
- Counting sheep.
- Weird tea is the best tea. But any tea will do in a pinch.
- BIPOC communities saving heirloom seeds.
Nibbles: Agroforestry app, Virtual grazing areas, Tunisian herbalists, India agrobiodiversity
- An app to help farmers choose agroforestry species in India.
- An app to keep cows on the straight and narrow in Epping Forest.
- The herbalists of Tunis could maybe do with an app.
- There’s no app to stop agrobiodiversity loss. Even in India.
Brainfood: Neodomestication, Millet diets, OFSP, Fruits, Okra core, Floating gardens, Quinoa evaluation, Bean cooking, Neolithic, Lychee genome, Climate change, European maize double
- Scaling up neodomestication for climate-ready crops. Ok, but when is enough enough?
- Can Feeding a Millet-Based Diet Improve the Growth of Children? — A Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis. Yes. So maybe make the most of the crops we already have?
- Does vitamin A rich orange-fleshed sweetpotato adoption improve household level diet diversity? Evidence from Ghana and Nigeria. Sometimes. So maybe make the most of the crops we already have?
- Global interdependence for fruit genetic resources: status and challenges in India. So many crops out there.
- DATASET: The World Vegetable Center okra (Abelmoschus esculentus) core collection as a source for flooding stress tolerance traits for breeding. This is one way of making the most of the crops we already have.
- The floating garden agricultural system of the Inle lake (Myanmar) as an example of equilibrium between food production and biodiversity maintenance. This is another way of making the most of the crops we already have.
- Phenotyping a diversity panel of quinoa using UAV-retrieved leaf area index, SPAD-based chlorophyll and a random forest approach. Oh look, here’s another, and all you need is a drone and fancy maths.
- The Phaseolus vulgaris L. Yellow Bean Collection: genetic diversity and characterization for cooking time. For this one you don’t even need a drone.
- Prehistoric Farming Settlements in Western Anatolia. What, only 5 crops?
- Two divergent haplotypes from a highly heterozygous lychee genome suggest independent domestication events for early and late-maturing cultivars. Ancient farmers knew what they were doing after all, eh?
- Expected global suitability of coffee, cashew and avocado due to climate change. Millennials could be in trouble if new crops don’t come along.
- Traditional Foods From Maize (Zea mays L.) in Europe. Maybe European millennials could eat more maize.
- Growing maize landraces in industrialized countries: from the search for seeds to the emergence of new practices and values. Nah, let’s domesticate something else instead.