- Q&A with an archaeobotanist looking into the domestication history of maize and gourds.
- Q&A with the curators of the University of California, Riverside Citrus Variety Collection.
- Q&A on the shea tree genome.
- CIP’s potato cryobank. There’s probably a Q&A somewhere too.
- Snippets of a review of an interesting-sounding book about the almost-forgotten Pignolo grape.
- Snippets of the Indigenous ecological knowledge used by traditional agriculturalists in India.
- A more systematic approach to documenting and protecting Indigenous ecological knowledge from Australia.
Nibbles: China agrobiodiversity, Hedge apple, Maize history, AI and extinction, Mapping pastures, Mapping foodscapes
- China makes progress in its agrobiodiversity census.
- Osage orange history deconstructed: “horse high, hog tight, and bull strong.”
- Maize history deconstructed.
- Using AI to assess the vulnerability of plant species. Vulnerability of landraces next?
- Not sure about landraces, but maybe pasturelands?
- Mapping food systems to save them.
Brainfood: IK, CWR, AnGR valuation double, Open cryo hardware, Seed pathogens, Perennial grains, Tropical forages, Tree breeding, Resurrection, Arabica origins, Fragaria, CIP sweetpotato
- Contributions of Indigenous Knowledge to ecological and evolutionary understanding. The importance of IK is considerable for PGRFA conservation and use too, of course, and the injunction to “enter into a thoughtful social contract with IK holders, foremost working toward partnered research that benefits the communities, governments, and nations of Indigenous peoples” goes double.
- Harnessing Crop Wild Diversity for Climate Change Adaptation.. …needs open data. Genomic data, that is, rather than IK. I wonder if there’s quid pro quo here.
- Genetic Identity, Diversity, and Population Structure of CIP’s Sweetpotato (I. batatas) Germplasm Collection. An entire collection of about 6000 accessions genotyped to reveal 4 ancestral populations, some duplication within and between genebanks, plus possible mistakes in labelling. Ah, data!
- Information use and its effects on the valuation of agricultural genetic resources. Giving the public more data may increase the support for animal genetic resources conservation. But what kind of data? Read on…
- Consumers’ knowledge and perceptions of endangered livestock breeds: How wording influences conservation efforts. Focus on the nice taste rather than the rarity or endangerment of breeds, as it turns out. Accentuate the positive?
- The emerging role of open technologies for community-based improvement of cryopreservation and quality management for repository development in aquatic species. Hardware can be open too.
- Longevity of Plant Pathogens in Dry Agricultural Seeds during 30 Years of Storage. Clean your seeds, genebanks.
- Sustainable agriculture through perennial grains: Wheat, rice, maize, and other species. A review. Promises, promises…
- Tapping Into the Environmental Co-benefits of Improved Tropical Forages for an Agroecological Transformation of Livestock Production Systems. Location, location, location.
- ‘Systems approach’ plant breeding illustrated by trees. Link up different plant breeding approaches in fun ways rather than doubling down on any single one.
- A pragmatic and prudent consensus on the resurrection of extinct plant species using herbarium specimens. I must say I would not have been so prudent.
- Validating South Sudan as a Center of Origin for Coffea arabica: Implications for Conservation and Coffee Crop Improvement. No time for prudence here.
- Diversification, spread, and admixture of octoploid strawberry in the Western Hemisphere. Yes, that’s all very interesting, but tell me more about that Hawaiian strawberry.
Brainfood: Transeurasian languages, Japanese rice, Grapevine pip shapes, Citrus evolution & domestication, Yak domestication, Brassica domestication, Coffee diversity, Switchgrass diversity, Onion landrace, Seed systems
- Triangulation supports agricultural spread of the Transeurasian languages. People speaking the precursor of Japonic, Koreanic, Tungusic, Mongolic and Turkic languages started out around the West Liao River and then spread with their Panicum millet farming, mixing with other populations and picking up rice and wheat along the way.
- Artificial selection in the expansion of rice cultivation. They managed to get to Hokkaido with that rice because of a couple of genes. Rice genes, that is.
- Pip shape echoes grapevine domestication history. If they had carried grapevines, we’d be able to say which varieties.
- Shaping the biology of citrus: I. Genomic determinants of evolution. They maybe had a role in citrus domestication, but a lot of the hard work was done by the prior adaptive radiation of the group. The citrus group, that is. Quick summary of both papers here if you can get access to it.
- Yak Domestication: A Review of Linguistic, Archaeological, and Genetic Evidence. They weren’t involved in yak domestication, though, I don’t think.
- The Evolutionary History of Wild, Domesticated, and Feral Brassica oleracea (Brassicaceae). Nor that of Brassica oleracea, whose closest wild relative turns out to be half a world away on Crete.
- Coffee: Genetic Diversity, Erosion, Conservation, and Utilization. Ok, stay with me here. Brassica oleracea is related to Brassica carinata, which originated in Ethiopia, which is also where arabica coffee comes from.
- Surveying Grassland Islands: the genetics and performance of Appalachian switchgrass (Panicum virgatum L.) collections. If you can find a close connection between coffee and switchgrass you get a prize. Ah no wait, there are 2 ploidy levels, just like in Coffea. Yeah, I know it’s tenuous.
- Agrobiodiversity-Oriented Food Systems between Public Policies and Private Action: A Socio-Ecological Model for Sustainable Territorial Development. These guys really know their onions. And think they can use their conservation as a spur to local development. In Italy, but who’s to say it couldn’t work in Ethiopia as well.
- Putting diverse farming households’ preferences and needs at the centre of seed system development. Imagine.
Nibbles: Cheddar cheese, Chickpea festival, Senegal rice, Great Plains, Brazilian fruit, Hungry Eye
- There’s a national chickpea championship, but in Spain.
- Senegal is getting its rice back. No word on any championship.
- The Great Plains are not coming back, alas. Spoiler alert: rice and chickpeas are not to blame.
- Cheddar is trying to get its cheese back, though, and has a chance.
- Cool book on the fruits of Brazil. I bet some would go great with cheddar.
- Review of what seems a cool book on the history of food in Europe. I wonder if it explains the whole cheese-with-fruit thing.