#farming

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Missing a hen as I put the chickens away from free ranging this afternoon. Not seen in any adjacent yard or anywhere on the property. I'll be keeping them all in their pen for a few days in case a fox is about!

"OpenSourceSeeds is committed to re-establishing seed as a common good for all.

We do this by providing new varieties with an open-source licence. This is an easy way to legally protect seed from patents and other forms of privatization." šŸŒ±šŸšœšŸ‘Øā€šŸŒ¾

šŸ’» https://www.opensourceseeds.org/en/home
šŸ“ŗ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MlKQLX_rieg
šŸ“ŗ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gBX6CNfEkk4&t=2

Note: Federal emergency water dump order appears to be sending water to nowhere, even though it's reserved for farmers in the Tulare Valley.

https://sjvwater.org/trumps-emergency-water-order-responsible-for-water-dump-from-tulare-county-lakes/

Tulare County water managers were perplexed and frustrated, noting both physical and legal barriers that make it virtually impossible for Tulare County river water to be used for southern California fires. First, it would have to be pumped at great expense across the San Joaquin Valley to get to the California Aqueduct and then travel hundreds of miles south. Second, this isnā€™t ā€œlooseā€ water free for the taking. ā€œEvery drop belongs to someone,ā€ said Kaweah River Watermaster Victor Hernandez. ā€œThe reservoir may belong to the federal government, but the water is ours. If someoneā€™s playing political games with this water, itā€™s wrong.ā€ It was no game on Thursday when area water managers were given about an hourā€™s notice that the Army Corps planned to release water up to ā€œchannel capacity,ā€ the top amount rivers can handle, immediately.

The connection between high fertiliser use and a massive reduction in floqwer numbers and pollinating insects has been confirmed in the longest running study of the subject to date.

This should come as no surprise but it is another example of how modern farming methods (including ploughing practices) are preparing us for a bleak future.

https://www.nature.com/articles/s44185-024-00070-6

https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2025/jan/20/uk-agriculture-farming-fertilisers-yields-biodiversity-study-park-grass-pollinators-bees-wildflowers-aoe

PHOTO a Honeybee on a bright yellow hawkbit flower

Indigenous Tribes Engineered British Columbiaā€™s Modern Hazelnut Forests More Than 7,000 Years Ago
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https://www.science.org/content/article/indigenous-tribes-engineered-british-columbia-s-modern-hazelnut-forests-more-7000-years <-- shared technical article
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https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.2402304121 <-- shared paper
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[not my usual ā€˜sort of thingā€™ to post - as broad as that is - but I found this fascinating; it reminds me, in a sense, of the Incas incrementally selecting corn stock that can handle higher and higher altitudes, in ā€˜research stationsā€™, although those were a domesticated crop]

charts - Clustering results of hazelnut individuals obtained by discriminant analysis of principal components (DAPC) and Bayesian-based structure analysis. (A) Plot of the first two axes from a principal component analysis (PCA) of 219 hazelnut samples genotyped for 9,650 SNPs showing differentiation between South Coast, Interior, and North samples. Groups are shown as different colors and inertia ellipses (95% of variance), while dots represent individuals. (B) Structure plot showing the posterior probabilities of assignment of individuals to the different clustering groups.
map - Six genetically distinct clusters of hazelnuts are represented in the study region, with four groups in the ā€œisolatedā€ northern region. Considering ethnographic and archaeological records of hazelnut management among Tsā€™msyen, Nisgaā€™a, Gitanyow, and Gitxsan, this genetic diversity very likely reflects ancient management and cultivation efforts.
photo - hazelnut seed in tree, British Columbia, Canada
photo - First Nation member in a hazelnut kitchen, British Columbia, Canada

Heirloom seed saving, swapping, and celebrating are booming among gardeners, farmers, and everyday people ā€“ something experts see as important for biodiversity and food security.

https://www.csmonitor.com/Environment/2024/1010/heirloom-seed-swaps-gardening-biodiversity?utm_source=flipboard&utm_medium=activitypub

Posted into YOUR CLIMATE IS CHANGING @your-climate-is-changing-csmonitor

A couple of fields of Borage breaking up the green and gold of the countryside in Shropshire today.
Apparently the local 'Food Centre' are using it to produce 'Borage Honey' thanks to a load of bee hives that are somewhere in the area.

A zoomed image of a few trees on the horizon, a field of blue/purple borage flowers leading to them. Grey clouds filling the sky
A carpet of blue/purple Borage flowers cover the foreground to the near horizon where a few trees sit in the centre. Distant low hills can be seen in the distance under a blue sky with low grey clouds
A wide panorama view of a field ob blue/purple borage flowers. distant hills seen on the left, a few trees on the horizon in the middle, under a grey cloudy sky with some blue showing through

& picks of the day:

āž”ļø @droughtcenter - The National Drought Mitigation Center, tracking drought conditions in USA

āž”ļø @CAFS - Canadian academic association encouraging research into food systems

āž”ļø @sentientmedia - Non-profit org looking at effects of factory farming on animals & environment

āž”ļø @sarahtaber - Crop scientist, ex-farmworker, running for office as Commissioner of Agriculture

āž”ļø @jocelynbosse - Legal expert researching plant, food & agricultural IP law

šŸ§µ 1/3

commented on "Wenn der Bauer pfeift, dann muĢˆssen die Heuerleute kommen!" - Betrachtungen und Forschungen zum Heuerlingswesen in Nordwestdeutschland by Helmut Lensing

Helmut Lensing, Bernd Robben: "Wenn der Bauer pfeift, dann muĢˆssen die Heuerleute kommen!" - Betrachtungen und Forschungen zum Heuerlingswesen in Nordwestdeutschland (2020, Verlag der Studiengesellschaft fuĢˆr EmslaĢˆndische Regionalgeschichte) No rating

I snagged this book while visiting the Open Air Museum in Cloppenburg (which I recommend highly to anyone interested in the history and lifestyle of rural farms in Northwestern Germany - just make sure you have an entire day's worth of time to see all of it).

This book details the life and problems of rural tenant farmers in Northwestern Germany - people who did not own their own land, but had to rent it from the wealthier farmers and do manual labor for those same farmers in order to get by.

There are reasons why approximately 5.5 million Germans emigrated in the 19th century up until WWI, and the desperate poverty of much of the rural population is a huge part of it. #Germany #history #farming

Colorful wood duck painting collage by artist and poet Sharon Cummings. Haiku in post.