Diversity and Desire:

Public Broadcasting System better known as PBS from time to time has truly remarkable programming. Such a program happened this past week and more can be found here The Botany of Desire. This is from the book by Michael Pollan. While there are many lessons to be learned from watching this 2 hour show the lesson I learned is that diversity is a good thing. Many folks might not take this lesson away with them but I did.

A short summary can be found here. Some facts that I did not know were presented on apples the seed of which bear almost no resemblance to parent tree. I have grown generations of plants from the seed of the previous year. Needless to say this fact about apples shattered my basic concept of what a seed is. Once I recovered I questioned the whole story of Johnny Appleseed. My worries were nicely anticipated by the author.

The lessons of the potato were perhaps more fundamental. I had not realized the huge impact this divers plant had on agriculture in both the mountains of South America and subsequently on the agriculture of Europe. Without the humble potato the Industrial Revolution simply could not have occurred. Population centers in northern Europe would never have been possible because there would have been nothing for these people to eat. This can be most clearly seen in Ireland. The consequences of over dependence on a single species can also be seen in the Irish Potato Famine. The lessons learned in the 1850s are being ignored in America today. American potato growers almost exclusively plant and harvest Russet Burbank potato. This plant was developed by Luther Burbank in the 1870s. The potato in America has become a monoculture. Monoculture is the opposite of a diverse culture.

The segments on beauty and mind altering are left as an exercise for my readers. There are new facts revealed by both of these segments. But I do not wish to deprive my readers of the fun of discovering these facts.