Wild relatives

May 11, 2015May 11, 2015

British crop wild relatives on show

I fear we may have omitted to mention that a selection of Britain’s crop wild relatives would feature in one of the gardens on show at the Royal Horticultural Society’s Malvern Spring Festival. This was the brainchild of the McLaughlin sisters, Caitlin and Tessa.

Well, the show has come and gone, and the Genetic Conservation Garden, as it is called, has come away with the silver medal. Very well done, Caitlin and Tessa!

The @StanbrookAbbey @amazing_venues #RHSMalvern sponsored garden achieved Silver medal today! Over the moon! pic.twitter.com/6Ehs8f5uK0

— Tessa McLaughlin (she/her) (@Tessa_teaching) May 7, 2015

May 11, 2015May 4, 2015

Brainfood: Chinese CWR, Black-bone goat, Agrobiodiversity & nutrition, Niger rice, Rabbit diversity, On farm, Adding value, Native Americans & Svalbard, USDA wheat core, Cooperatives & food security, Maize & CC

China’s crop wild relatives: Diversity for agriculture and food security. 871 wild species related to crops important in China, some of them endemic and endangered.
Black-bone goat: An investigation report on new genetic resource of farm animal. Out of China…
Effects of agricultural biodiversity and seasonal rain on dietary adequacy and household food security in rural areas of Kenya. More dietary diversity is better for your kids’ nutrition, and so is rain.
Farmers’ rice knowledge and adoption of new cultivars in the Tillabéry region of western Niger. The landrace is hippopotamus-resistant.
An invasive non-native mammal population conserves genetic diversity lost from its native range. Same for some crop wild relatives?
Diversifying mechanisms in the on-farm evolution of crop mixtures. Diversity within mixture of 4 French wheat landraces changes in different ways in different places.
The Role of Local Sheep and Goat Breeds and Their Products as a Tool for Sustainability and Safeguard of the Mediterranean Environment. Cheese made from local breeds is better. Well, at least different.
Saving seeds: The Svalbard Global Seed Vault, Native American seed savers, and problems of property. “…the Svalbard Global Seed Vault is unique in its potential ability to cross the political and cultural divide over the ownership and conservation of seeds and thereby promote the vital ecological need for both ex situ and in situ seed preservation.”
Genetic Diversity among Wheat Accessions from the USDA National Small Grains Collection. Geography is a good basis on which to base a core collection.
Food sovereignty, food security and fair trade: the case of an influential Nicaraguan smallholder cooperative. They can all be integrated, but food security is the difficult one.
Maize migration: key crop expands to higher altitudes under climate change in the Andes. 10m a year.

May 8, 2015May 8, 2015

Nibbles: Chontaduro, Pandanus, African seeds, Bangladesh veggie seeds, Black locust, Agroecology, Food security research, Deforestation, Ancient Caribbean

Colombia plants a bunch of peach palms. Hope they had some genetic diversity in there.
Crop wild relative can tell you where diamonds are.
Africa might need better seeds.
Bangladesh certainly does.
The black locust made America. The tree, not the insect.
Another pean to agrobiodiversity.
Towards a Research Agenda for Global Food and Nutrition Security: meeting at Expo 2015 organized by the EU. It’s today, though, and this is the first we hear of it. Sorry. Will genebanks even get mentioned? Well, if this tweet is from that meeting, it seems not.
Cutting down forest bad for more than trees. How many crop and livestock wild relatives endangered by deforestation?
Cubans ate cultivated plants a thousand years earlier than thought.

May 7, 2015May 7, 2015

Nibbles: Food supplies, Food fotos, Forest foods, Diverse foods, Caribbean cassava, Wild foods, Expo 2015, Gates & SDGs, Nanoparticles

What the World Eats: The Infographic.
What the World Eats: The Photo Competition.
What the World Doesn’t Eat: Forest Foods.
What the World Should Eat More Of: The Presentation.
What Grenada Eats: Cassava
What Christopher McCandless Should Not Have Eaten: Not ODAP After All?
Gulf states big stars in Milan. So that’s all right then.
Gates Foundation really doesn’t like the SDGs.
Boffins find promiscuous Phytophthora killer. Breeders surrender.

May 4, 2015May 4, 2015

Brainfood: Tomato diversity, Tomato characterization, Sweetpotato diversity, Olive characterization, Bamboo as fodder, Chinese liquor, Agroecological livestock, Oasis agrobiodiversity, Pearl millet diversity double

Genomic variation in tomato, from wild ancestors to contemporary breeding accessions. A first domestication in South America, a second step in Mesoamerica, occasional hybridization in the wild, differentiation through human selection. Some Ecuadorian and Peruvian diversity still unexplored for breeding.
Characterization of a collection of local varieties of tomato (Solanum lycopersicum L.) using conventional descriptors and the high-throughput phenomics tool Tomato Analyzer. Instant gratification comes to tomato characterization.
Molecular diversity and genetic structure of 380 sweetpotato accessions as revealed by SSR markers. Also a two-step domestication history? What are the odds?
Association of SSR markers with contents of fatty acids in olive oil and genetic diversity analysis of an olive core collection. Let the molecular-assisted breeding begin.
Genetic Evaluation of Nutritional and Fodder Quality of Different Bamboo Species. Remarkably, some species are ok.
Genetic Diversity Among the Microorganisms in Daqu Used for Beidacang Liquor as Revealed by RAPD Analyses. Well that’s a new one on me, but it’s good to have the data.
Farm animal genetic and genomic resources from an agroecological perspective. If you’re going to really be ecological in your management of livestock genetic resources, you need to factor in ecosystem services, and figure out how genomic tools are going to help you. Well, that pretty much goes for crops too, surely.
The labor of agrodiversity in a Moroccan oasis. Not all agrobiodiversity is that old.
Identification of pearl millet (Pennisetum glaucum (L.) R. Br.) germplasm with unique popping quality in the national genebank collections of India. Amazing what you can find in genebanks.
Iniadi pearl millet germplasm as a valuable genetic resource for high grain iron. See what I mean?