Posts

Posted on

Free rice

From our friends at the Lubin Library, news of a way to have fun, gain bragging rights, and do good. Go to Free Rice and tell the web site what words mean. The web site says they’ll send rice to hungry people, 10 grains per word. I hope they do, because I’m a naive, trusting type of guy.

As for the bragging, I just donated 400 grains of rice, guessed “santori” correctly, have learned the true meaning of “demimonde,” which I have been misusing, and drew stumps at “chaffer.”

Go. Do better. Comment here.

Nothing to do with agrobiodiversity (mind you, they don’t say what kind of rice, or rices …) but some things are worth noting even so.

Posted on

Fine beans

We just received a message from Christine, a reader in New Zealand, who hopes ultimately to do a roundup of seed-saving efforts down there for us. In the meantime, she has a question:

Yesterday I sowed Fin de Bagnol bean seeds, an heirloom French variety. As I did so I wondered what the name meant – it seemed strange to have ‘End’ in a seed name. I did a spot of googling to try and find an answer, but no luck.

Maybe you have a French contact who knows?

Indeed, maybe we do. Meantime, I think that fin in this case means “fine” or “slender” rather than “end”. There are other French beans with the same word; Deuil Fin Precoce for one, which is early (precocious).

So my guess is that this is a fine, slender bean of the Bagnols, but whether it is a Bagnol family, or the rather fine Château de Bagnols (which might be linked to the family) I cannot say. Probably the Château.

But maybe someone out there knows for sure.