Wild relatives

January 16, 2012January 16, 2012

Brainfood: Conservation policy, Grasspea breeding, Modeling rice diseases, Maize roots, Literature on new oil crops, Native vs non-native trees in Indonesian city parks, Cherimoya maps, Darwin Core, Seed dispersal and conservation, Oxalis variation, Polyploidy and variation, Pollinators, Microsymbionts, Plant migration, Culture and agriculture

As ever, we have added most of these references to our public group on Mendeley, for ease of finding. “Most?” we hear you say. “What gives?” Well, Mendeley and some academic publishers still don’t play nicely. There’s nothing to stop you adding the paper in question by hand, if you’re so inclined, but we don’t really have the time. And if you do, please do it right.

Why are some biodiversity policies implemented and others ignored? Lessons from the uptake of the Global Strategy for Plant Conservation by botanic gardens. Because there are no feedback mechanisms?
Genetic improvement of grass pea (Lathyrus sativus) in Ethiopia: an unfulfilled promise. Conventional breeding for low ODAP hasn’t worked, so forget about solving that problem through conventional breeding, and move on to other problems, or use genetic transformation.
Modeling and mapping potential epidemics of rice diseases globally. It is not particularly well done, but one is surprised to see it done at all. NiM ¹
Morphological and physiological characteristics of corn (Zea mays L.) roots from cultivars with different yield potentials. More roots means more yield. Among some modern varieties anyway. Under some conditions. NiM
Trends in literature on new oilseed crops and related species: Seeking evidence of increasing or waning interest. And finding it, alas. Sort of. NiM
The green colonial heritage: Woody plants in parks of Bandung, Indonesia. Native species used to be used more, and should be used more again. NiM
Mapping Genetic Diversity of Cherimoya (Annona cherimola Mill.): Application of Spatial Analysis for Conservation and Use of Plant Genetic Resources. Cool maps of microsat hotspots.
Darwin Core: An Evolving Community-Developed Biodiversity Data Standard. The way out of Genebank Database Hell? Well, maybe the match that will light the torch that will show the way out.
Seed dispersal in changing landscapes. Fragmentation, harvesting, invasions and climate change affect seed dispersal in ways that need to be understood by conservationists. NiM. And the BBC’s more verbose take on it.
Distribution models and a dated phylogeny for Chilean Oxalis species reveal occupation of new habitats by different lineages, not rapid adaptive radiation. Title says it all, really. It’s not that a single lineage exploded as new habitats became available. Old lineages were pre-adapted to the new habitats. ²
Extensive chromosomal variation in a recently formed natural allopolyploid species, Tragopogon miscellus (Asteraceae). Polyploidy leads to all hell breaking lose in the genome for generations.
Overplaying the role of honey bees as pollinators: A comment on Aebi and Neumann (2011). It’s the wild bees, hoverflies and other native pollinators, stupid! But still.
Arbuscular Mycorrhizas Reduce Nitrogen Loss via Leaching. 40 times less, no less.
Distributional migrations, expansions, and contractions of tropical plant species as revealed in dated herbarium records. Eppur si muovono. And more on the paper. And more on herbarium digitization in general. what can I tell you, I’ve got apophenia.
Ecological and socio-cultural factors influencing in situ conservation of crop diversity by traditional Andean households in Peru. There are influences; and why wouldn’t there be?

January 9, 2012January 9, 2012

Brainfood: Climate change in Europe, Slow cheese in Portugal, Grapevine diversity in Spain, Noni in India, Farmers and pastoralists in Jordan, Stevia everywhere, Almond genes flow, Peanuts, Disease control

Representing two centuries of past and future climate for assessing risks to biodiversity in Europe. Temperature up 3-6°C throughout Europe by end of century, rainfall down in south, up in north. Sounds lovely.
Gourmandizing Poverty Food: The Serpa Cheese Slow Food Presidium. Trying to bring back a lost Portuguese cheese is romantic and elitist. Wish they’d just say what they really mean.
Genetic diversity of wild grapevine populations in Spain and their genetic relationships with cultivated grapevines. If there’s a genetic contribution of wild grapevines to cultivated in Spain, it’s not great.
Revisiting the origin of the domestication of noni (Morinda citrifolia L.). Let’s just say Pacific islanders won’t be pleased.
The desert and the sown: Nomad–farmer interactions in the Wadi Faynan, southern Jordan. Changes from sedentarism to pastoralism are mainly due to chance.
Stevia rebaudiana Bertoni, source of a high-potency natural sweetener: A comprehensive review on the biochemical, nutritional and functional aspects. Not just sweetness, folic acid, vitamin C and all of the indispensable amino acids except tryptophan too.
Gene flow among wild and domesticated almond species: insights from chloroplast and nuclear markers. The main insight being that it happens a lot, in both directions.
Agricultural Technology, Crop Income, and Poverty Alleviation in Uganda. New peanut varieties increase incomes and reduce poverty, but aren’t enough on their own.
Plant diversity improves protection against soil-borne pathogens by fostering antagonistic bacterial communities. It sure does, at least in a long-term grassland.

January 2, 2012January 2, 2012

Leftovers: Coconuts, Genebank, Vegetables, Famine, Danish, Bissap, Brazil nuts, Dates, Papas y mas, Fruit, Rice, Everything

We found these nibbles at the back of the fridge, and they’re not too mouldy, so lets fry them up before we get anything fresh.

Boss of India’s agricultural research exhorts international coconut genebank to do more and be heard.
And, first out of the gate for 2012, Nepal says it will create a new genebank for plants “on the verge of extinction”.
Immigrant urban agriculture — in Cleveland, Ohio.
Aid man Edward Carr interviewed: “drought does not equal famine”
Meetings on “biodiversity” in Europe, under the Danish presidency. Indigestible?
Hibiscus tea, what a tonic.
Resources Research goes crazed for book about brazil nuts, and other Amazonian agrobiodiversity.
A cure for Bayoud disease of dates? And it’s based on medicinal plants!
Pueblos andinos reciben ejemplares de tubérculos nativos. Otra vez?
Guerilla grafting? Now there’s an idea for “covert agriculture”. Wonder what the graftees think.
“The giant panda of the botanical world”? Blimey. A new reserve for real wild rice.
Huge Satoyama-style paper from Bioversity on THE USE OF AGROBIODIVERSITY BY INDIGENOUS AND TRADITIONAL AGRICULTURAL COMMUNITIES IN: ADAPTING TO CLIMATE CHANGE And they’re the ones doing the shouting.

December 15, 2011January 15, 2014

Nibbles: Law book, Sheep breeding, Pig breeding, Pink mushrooms, Coconut genome, Cassava genome, Apples in the Big Apple, Street food, Irish corner, Peach palm tissue culture, Seed saving, Kenyan farmers, First farmers, Tenure, Peppermint facts, Mountains, Taro network, Shea

Juliana Santilli guest-blogs on the book Agrobiodiversity and the Law over at Agrobiodiversity Grapevine.
ICARDA tells communities how to set up a sheep breeding programme.
While an Indian institute breeds pigs, with Canadian help.
Another Indian institute does the same for mushrooms, with no help.
And yet another sequences the coconut genome.
While BGI sequences a whole bunch of CIAT cassava stuff. Only yesterday they were doing rice. Yeah, but only 50, and you gotta keep those sequencers going, don’t you? Would be nice to know how much the CGIAR is paying BGI annually. Do they get frequent flyer miles? Have they negotiated a corporate rate?
A Kazakhstan apple tree grows on the East River. A forest, actually. If it had been in England, it might eventually feature here. Ok, ok, our quest for connections is occasionally overdone. Made you look, though.
Ah, kimchi! Ah, fish empanadas! So much interesting food, only one stomach lining…
Danny tells us about Ireland’s CWR database. In other news, Ireland has CWR. Oh, and then he goes crazy on the Biodiversity for Nutrition mailing list. Did he get his goat is what I want to know.
AoB on in vitro peach palms. Why read the paper, when AoB abstracts the abstract?
Bifurcated Carrots on seed saving in Canada. Video goodness galore.
And while we’re talking cinema, here’s news of a movie on a year in the life of four Kenyan farmers.
From Kenyan farmers to First Farmers. The Womb of Nations. I like that. And more. Agricultural hearths. I like that too.
Four days of discussion about land tenure. May not be enough, actually.
“…70 per cent of the peppermint sold in the US is descended from a mutant in a neutron-irradiated source.” Good to know.
I missed International Mountains Day. Again.
That EU-funded taro mega-project from a PNG perspective.
What I like about this Worldwatch series on neglected plants is that they’re not factsheets. Yet.

December 14, 2011December 14, 2011

Nibbles: Bees and climate change, Native American seeds and health, Sustainable harvesting and cultivation, Tree death, Grass and C, Vegetables, Fishmeal, Big Milk

Today: Connections Edition, in which we pick low-hanging fruit, think outside the box, and join up the dots.

The return of a US bumblebee. Is it due to climate change?
“These foods have meaning” for a Native American tribe (and for Africans for that matter). So will they be able to check out their seeds? And sequence the hell out of them, like rice?
If you want to harvest palm heart sustainably in the Colombian Andes, only take 10% of any population a year. Is cultivation an option?
Trees are dying in the Sahel. And yet boffins don’t know how to kill them. No word on what the grass is doing.
Vegetables and nutrition: the theory and the practice. Of course, a lot of them are grown in cities.
Why is so much fish made into fishmeal rather than eaten? Location, location, location. Of markets, that is. Kind of like for milk.