Wild relatives

Nibbles: Cattle nutrition, Maize, Freshwater biota, Modeling maize, Rice, Book, Veg, Urban ag

Climate change ain’t going to be good for cattle.
But will be fabulous for breeders of drought-resistant maize.
A fifth of Africa’s freshwater plants and animals threatened. How many of these are important to local people’s nutrition and health? A lot, I bet.
Just a couple guys, modeling the spread of maize genetic diversity in the Americas.
Uganda turns to wild relatives for new rice varieties.
Toward Sustainable Agricultural Systems in the 21st Century recognizes importance of agrobiodiversity. Good to know.
New Agriculturalist revisits veg-garden-in-a-sack.
FAO policy brief on urban agriculture.

Evolutionary Applications has a Special Issue out devoted to “Evolution in Agro-Ecosystems. ” Attentive readers will spot the fact that we have already blogged about the papers on why there are no perennial grain crops and on the response of landraces to climate change. But there’s a lot more there.

How cool is it that a descendant of Charles Darwin is working on wild tomatoes on the Galapagos?
More on the Brazilian “Economic Miracle.”
Let my people plant trees on farmland!
Trouble for Syrian agriculture.
“The D. Landreth Seed Company has sold seeds to every president from George Washington to FDR.” And Obama?
Views on the durian.

Very sad to hear (belatedly) that Professor Emeritus Charles B. Heiser Jr. of Indiana University passed away on June 11, 2010. He was an extremely influential ethnobotanist, training many distinguished graduate students as well as having many wonderfully informative and entertaining popular books to his name.

CIFOR has a blog!
Nice series of videos on eating weeds.
Video on Peru’s “Andean rodeo.” You heard me.
Africa needs drought-tolerant maize. Ok, fair enough, but here’s my question. Shouldn’t they have done this study before doing all that breeding? Oh, who knows, maybe they did.
“Biofortification will thus remain relevant to poor rural populations in the years to come, as their incomes will still be far too low to afford a more diversified diet.” What? Who says a diversified diet need be expensive?
Russia faces looming buckwheat crisis. At least the genetic resources are safe in the Vavilov Institute. Unless of course somebody decides to, I don’t know, build luxury villas there, or something.