FERN’s Friday Feed: The weeds are winning
Welcome to FERN’s Friday Feed (#FFF), where we share the stories from this week that made us stop and think.
Herbicide resistance is growing. Cue the novel weed-whacking strategies.
MIT Technology Review
“Since the 1980s, more and more plants have evolved to become immune to the biochemical mechanisms that herbicides leverage to kill them. This herbicidal resistance threatens to decrease yields—out-of-control weeds can reduce them by 50% or more, and extreme cases can wipe out whole fields,” writes Douglas Main. “[T]he solution is to ‘not focus solely on herbicides for weed management,’ says Micheal Owen, a weed scientist and emeritus professor at Iowa State University.” One California weed scientist “developed a prototype that injects steam into the ground, killing weeds within several inches of the entry point. This has proved around 90% effective … But it is not exactly quick: It takes two or three days to treat a 10-acre block … A company called Carbon Robotics … produces an AI-driven system called the LaserWeeder that, as the name implies, uses lasers to kill weeds. It is designed to pilot itself up and down crop rows, recognizing unwanted plants and vaporizing them with one of its 30 lasers.”
AI is making an adventurous and sustainable plant-based diet possible
Anthropocene Magazine
“The carton looks like every other carton in the cooler. The white cardboard pyramid, dewy with condensation, has the usual screw-top cap and waxy feel. It recalls school lunches, morning breakfast cereal,” writes Veronique Greenwood. “The liquid within looks exactly like milk. It tastes almost exactly like milk. But it was designed by biochemists and computer scientists who combed databases of plant-based ingredients using artificial intelligence, trying to predict what combinations would yield the milkiest not-milk. The final list developed by the Not Company, a Chilean startup that uses AI to create mimics of animal products, includes pineapple juice and cabbage concentrate. NotChicken nuggets draw on ingredients like fava beans and peach powder, without tasting like fava beans or peaches. There’s a NotBurger, too, and NotIceCream, available in the South American markets where the company got its start, as well as in Mexico. NotCo expanded into the US in late 2020—NotMilk was their first product available in US markets.”
Trump likely to undo Biden’s progress on seed industry’s power
Investigate Midwest
“In the U.S., a handful of companies produce and control most of the seeds farmers buy — the building blocks not just of food but of valuable commodities such as biofuels and ingredients in processed snacks and drinks. To protect their high-dollar investments, the companies patent their creations. Now, they own the vast majority of the industry’s intellectual property. But the level of concentration can cause problems for farmers and independent seed breeders, the Biden administration’s USDA contends,” writes Sky Chadde. “[I]n October, it announced a new ‘framework’ … to start addressing them. Much of it focuses on the seed industry’s IP being in a few hands … While the framework does not force any new requirements on the seed industry — one expert called it ‘weak sauce’ — it demonstrated the Biden administration’s priorities. However, with Donald Trump returning to the Oval Office, its future is in question. During his first term, Trump oversaw three mergers that further consolidated the seed industry.”
Finding food, and solace, in the intertidal
Hakai Magazine
“I’m not surprised that people have turned to the intertidal for solace during times of crisis. Shellfishing elicits some of the most primal positive emotions of our species: the dopamine rush of searching for rewards, and the deeply ancient bliss of finding food outside with your kin. The oldest known shell middens—heaps of empty shells left by human harvesters—are found in southern and northwestern Africa and date back to the Last Interglacial, around 128,000 years ago. But scientists assume people have been eating bivalves for much longer,” writes Emma Marris, “essentially as long as humans have lived on coasts. Some anthropologists even think our aptitude for gleaning in the intertidal kicked off the population boom that eventually nudged humans to explore beyond our homelands in Africa.”
The kitchen with two doors
Longreads
“In spite of my confidence in cooking, I’ve never brought mulukhiyah into my urban kitchen,” writes Kristina Kasparian. “Eating it without my family’s elbows pressed against mine doesn’t make sense to me. I know I’d feel like an impostor, inserting myself into the sacred and altering it irreparably, as I can’t help but reinvent recipes with my own improvised impulses. As tempted as I am to try, I’m afraid to fall short. So, I leave the art of mulukhiyah to my elders, and secretly wonder whether I am protecting the dish or myself.”