Agricultural Biodiversity Weblog

March 30, 2015March 31, 2015

Listening to the fizmer

A couple of weeks ago we Nibbled an article by the writer Robert Macfarlane on his decade-long effort to rescue local words for features of the British landscape from oblivion. Macfarlane also has a piece on this obsession of his in the latest alumni magazine of the University of Cambridge — he’s Senior Lecturer in Modern and Contemporary Literature there, after all. This includes evocative photographs of some of the terms he’s collected. Worth a look (p. 35).

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March 30, 2015March 31, 2015

Brainfood: IBPGR collecting, Persimmon diversity, ABS, On farm economics, Wild Colombian potatoes, Indian rice cores, Tibetan chickens, Ligonberry antioxidants, Tanzanian veggie IK, Melon sugar genes, Moroccan lentil diversity, Grasspea diversity, Quinoa ABS

Plant genetic resources collections and associated information as a baseline resource for genetic diversity studies: an assessment of the IBPGR-supported collections. 35% of 200,000 accessions collected by IBPGR from 1975-95 still in a genebank somewhere.
Genetic diversity among germplasms of Diospyros kaki based on SSR markers. Chinese non-astringent types closer to Chinese astringent types than to Japanese non-astringent types.
Ex Post Use Restriction and Benefit-sharing Provisions for Access to Non-plant Genetic Materials for Public Research. Up-front payments can be ok.
On Farm Conservation of Crop Genetic Resource: Declining De Facto Diversity and Optimal Funding Strategy. Fancy maths tells us to identify the landraces most likely to go extinct, and the farmers who can conserve them most cheaply.
Current situation of wild Solanum spp. L. sect. Petota (Solanum, Solanaceae) in some Colombian regions. Not great.
Identification of a diverse mini-core panel of Indian rice germplasm based on genotyping using micro satellite markers. Mini-core of 98 accessions based on molecular data recovers 94% of alleles in geographically-selected core of 6912 accessions from Indian collection. No word on how good the 6912 are in the first place.
Genomic analyses reveal potential independent adaptation to high altitude in Tibetan chickens. Tibetan chickens fall into 2 groups, both with signs of selection in several genes involved in the calcium-signalling pathway implicated in adaptation to the hypoxia experienced at high altitudes.
Antioxidant properties of lingonberry (Vaccinium vitis-idaea L.) leaves within a set of wild clones and cultivars. The wilds are better for you.
Knowledge Sharing Strategies on Traditional vegetables for Supporting Food Security in Kilosa District, Tanzania. Farmers talk about vegetables. Well there’s a shocker.
Variability of candidate genes, genetic structure and association with sugar accumulation and climacteric behavior in a broad germplasm collection of melon (Cucumis melo L.). 175 melons from 50 countries fall into 7 groups, fitting well with morphology and taxonomy. Ripening genes associated with diversification.
Genetic diversity analysis of Moroccan lentil (Lens culinaris Medik.) landraces using Simple Sequence Repeat and Amplified Fragment Length Polymorphisms reveals functional adaptation towards agro-environmental origins. Evidence of combination of functional and geographic groupings.
Genetic Diversity of Grasspea and Its Relative Species Revealed by SSR Markers. Asian landraces different to those from Africa/Europe. And all different from the wilds.
Quinoa and the exchange of genetic resources: improving the regulation system. Quinoa for Annex 1?

March 23, 2015March 14, 2015

Brainfood: Sustainable intensification, Shrimp IPR, Noog domestication, Nigerian leafy veggies, Basil smells, Cultural ES, Natural regeneration, Medicinal cucurbit

What is sustainable intensification? Views from experts. Ambiguous term which may not signify a departure from current practice anyway. Ecological intensification instead?
Intellectual Property Rights Access to Genetic Resources and Indian Shrimp Aquaculture: Evolving Policy Responses to Globalization. I kid you not.
Patterns of Domestication in the Ethiopian Oil-seed Crop Noug (Guizotia abyssinica). Weirdness, for a domesticated crop, not due to its wild relative messing things up. What it is due to is a “mystery.” Thanks, authors.
Bio-Banking on Neglected and Underutilized Plant Genetic Resources of Nigeria: Potential for Nutrient and Food Security. Never even heard of some of these.
Comparison of different Ocimum basilicum L. gene bank accessions analyzed by GC–MS and sensory profile. Among 12 cultivars in the Hungarian genebank, there are 5 distinct smell profiles. That actually seems quite a lot.
The role of cultural ecosystem services in landscape management and planning. Sometimes, they can hold you back.
Carbon farming via assisted natural regeneration as a cost-effective mechanism for restoring biodiversity in agricultural landscapes. It can be a viable use of land in parts of Queensland, depending on the price of C.
Ethnobotany of a threatened medicinal plant “Indravan” (Cucumis callosus) from central India. Cucumber wild relatives also medicinal.

March 17, 2015March 15, 2015

Crowdsourcing oca improvement

As any breeder will tell you at least once during any conversation you may have with them, crop improvement is a numbers game. Which makes it a very hard game for the so-called minor crops. Not enough money and not enough people limit the sheer number of crosses that can be made and new plants that can be evaluated, so progress is slow. Enter the internet: “Thanks to social media and the internet, amateur breeders can swap huge amounts of information.” That’s Owen, a breeder of ocas and other things tuberous down in Cornwall, as featured a couple of days ago in the gardening section of The Guardian. If you’d like to help the world develop day-length neutral oca varieties, you can follow Owen on Facebook and Twitter and join his Guild of Oca Breeders.

March 16, 2015March 5, 2015

Brainfood: Camelina improvement, School garden impact, Biodiversity rice, Seed networks, Indian wheat geography, Protected areas, Late blight resistance, Peanut biotech

Camelina as a sustainable oilseed crop: Contributions of plant breeding and genetic engineering. It will help that it’s close to Arabidopsis.
Sustenance and sustainability: maximizing the impact of school gardens on health outcomes. You need proper experimental design if you’re going to say that such an impact exists. But such an impact probably exists, sometimes.
Consumer preferences for agricultural products considering the value of biodiversity conservation in the Mekong Delta, Vietnam. Consumers are willing to pay extra for crane-friendly rice. Or at least they say they are.
An Analysis of Social Seed Network and Its Contribution to On-Farm Conservation of Crop Genetic Diversity in Nepal. Fancy software shows farmers exchange seeds, and it’s important.
Spatial Distribution of Trait-specific Diversity in Indian Wheat Collections. From 5930, 3973 are geo-referenced, showing where more collections need to be made. Unless of course they are among those 1957 and nobody can tell.
Walk on the Wild Side: Estimating the Global Magnitude of Visits to Protected Areas. 8 billion visits per year (80% in Europe and North America), generating $600 billion per year in direct in-country expenditure and $250 billion in consumer surplus. Remember that we spent $10 billion per year worldwide in safeguarding protected areas.
Allele Mining in Solanum Germplasm: Cloning and Characterization of RB-Homologous Gene Fragments from Late Blight Resistant Wild Potato Species. 17 gene fragments from 11 wild potato species could be useful in breeding for late blight resistance.
Genetic diversity of the world’s largest oil palm (Elaeis guineensis Jacq.) field genebank accessions using microsatellite markers. Extreme West Africa group, West-Central-East Africa group and Madagascar group, with the last quite distinct.
Progress in genetic engineering of peanut (Arachis hypogaea L.) — A review. Our jetpacks are in the mail.