- Next-generation sequencing strategies for characterizing the turkey genome. It never ends, does it. Meanwhile, we patiently await our jetpacks.
- Community-Based Management of Animal Genetic Resources (AnGR): Constraints and Prospects of AnGR Conservation in the Tropics. Best thing to do is improve the local breeds through village-level schemes. In Nigeria, that is.
- Comparison of seed viability among 42 species stored in a genebank. 80% loss in melon seed viability over 10 years sounds a bit high to me.
- Market Participation and Agro-Biodiversity Loss: The Case of Native Chili Varieties in the Amazon Rainforest of Peru. Selling to local retailers good for diversity, selling to wholesalers not so much.
- Stem and leaf rust resistance in wild relatives of wheat with D genome (Aegilops spp.). They all have it.
- Assessing rice and wheat germplasm collections using similarity groups. You can go quite far in identifying possible duplicates just with. passport data.
- Genetic Distinctiveness of the Herdwick Sheep Breed and Two Other Locally Adapted Hill Breeds of the UK. Close to each other geographically and ecologically, but quite genetically distinct. No word on whether village-level improvement necessary for their continued existence.
- Managing Potato Biodiversity to Cope with Frost Risk in the High Andes: A Modeling Perspective. Fancy maths confirms better to grow mixtures. Andean farmers nonplussed.
- Sweet potato (Ipomoea batatas L.) leaves as nutritional and functional foods. But they taste like shit. Just kidding, they’re good and good for you.
Rice diversity on display
Some great photos of the Genetic Resources Centre Annual Field Day over on IRRI’s Flickr site. IRRI’s breeders are invited to visit the genebank’s seed multiplication plots every year, to see if anything grabs their eye. The chessboard effect is due to sowing early and late varieties in an alternating pattern. I’m assured the contrast “is becoming more pronounced each year as the supporting data improve.” See for yourself by comparing with previous years.
Eat up all your Okinawa spinach
Speaking of Amanda, she also recently went on the Living with the Land boat ride at the Epcot theme park at Walt Disney World in Florida.
A relaxing 13-minute boat ride takes you on an informative journey through a tropical rain forest, an African desert complete with sandstorm, and the windswept plains of a small, turn-of-the-century family farm. Guests experience the struggles of the past and plans for farming in the future including Hydroponics, Aeroponics and Aquaculture. It’s not just about fruits and veggies, fish farms are on display. Since The Land is a Disney restaurant supplier, You could very well be seeing your entree. Wonder where those Mickey shaped cucumbers in your salad came from? This is where they’re grown. The educational content on this ride is geared more towards adults, but younger guests will love the boat ride and spotting the different fruits and vegetables.
Very educational, I’m sure. Anyway, this photo of hers featuring Okinawa Spinach caught my eye, even more than the Mickey shaped cucumbers, because I’d never heard of the stuff. Turns out to be Gynura bicolor, and to have really few accessions in the world’s genebanks. I wonder why Disney World picked on it in preference to any number of better known Asian vegetables. And whether they sell seeds in the gift shop. But it’s certainly one way to stimulate interest in a neglected species.
The truth about the DDR’s coffee
Many thanks to my colleague Amanda Dobson for this photo (click to embiggen) from the DDR Museum in Berlin. Sometimes one prefers a little less agricultural biodiversity in one’s food — and beverages — doesn’t one?
A cassava for the ages in Hawaii
Probably the biggest cassava you’ve ever seen, weighing in at about 80 kg. No word on what variety it is, alas, nor how long it was in the ground for.
