A letter from Belfast

This interesting paper was just sent to me by a friend. We have just left the year of the potato and this year we enter the anniversaries of Darwin's birth and the publication of "Origin of Species'. The paper, by M. Dearce at TCD, re-visits the correspondence between Darwin and James Torbitt, a Belfast wine merchant, regarding the latter's plans for breeding blight resistant potaoes around the 1880s.

Rural images

And the same fried has brought to my attention the nice photography of David Creedon, out of Cork who currently has an exhibition titled Ghosts of the Faithful Departed runnning at Photofusion, London. The exhibition tells the story in photos of mass emigration from rural Ireland during the 50s and 60s.

Farmers help to promote conservation

Here is an interesting article sent to me by a friend but which doesn't include a great deal of information. It highlights farmers being used to promote conservation and it would be useful to learn more about the project and how farmers are being used and if there is anything to do with promoting agricultural biodiversity.

Anyone with more information?

2009 Irish Landscape Conference

The 2009 Irish Landscape Conference will be held in Tullamore, Co. Offaly from October 13th-16th. The conference is targeted at policy and decision makers, local authorities, government agencies, NGOS, representative associations and individuals with an interest in landscape matters. If you are interested in attending please register your interest by contacting Anne Barcoe by e-mail: abarcoe@heritagecouncil.ie

A flyer regarding the conference can be downloaded here.

The crisis with no name

Interesting article from the Global Crop Diversity Trust (GCDT) about the difficulties of drawing attention to future food crises which have might have poor crop diversity as their cause. But is the Irish famine history´s biggest food crisis?

Great balls of vegetation

When not intoxicated with chicha another thing very noticeable in Cochabamba are the large numbers of little balls of vegetation that attach themselves to overhead electricity wires. I had never seen anything like it before. I also noticed the same 'balls' on some species of tree and initially thought it might be some type of witches broom but they were easily removed. After some enquiry and speculation it turns out they are some type of epiphyte belonging to the Bromeliaceae family (Tillandsia spp.) and apparently on Annex 3 of CITES!

The Chicha Boys

It comes close to a pint of the black stuff on a Saturday afternoon down the pub, with the lads and a live game on telly. I've just spent the afternoon in Cochabamba sampling a variety of chicha with a cosmopolitan group. All were made from maize and blended with wine but I have been told that I can get chicha made from amaranth and quinoa around town also. Chicha crawl here I come!