grassangel | The Botany of Desire; Michael Pollan (Reply)

Chloe reads non-fiction too!
But seriously, even though I have no green thumb at all (the best I can do is bulbs, which require NO work at all) this is a book partially about biology and about unnatural selection of plants by humans.
So I got out the book for this fact alone. That and that humans have co-evolved with not ONE other animal or plant but many is a pretty interesting though.

It is popular science though, which means there’s maybe a dozen or so pages worth of actual science in a 250 page book. The rest in author anecdotes, history, hypothesis and a bit of explanation.

There were a couple of things that struck chords in me, like monoculture is a bad thing and there should be variety in all our food crops (and I suddenly understand why heirloom foods are ‘fashionable’ now), that genetically modified crops were considered pesticides even though they were meant for eating and that the American potato farming method is rather scary (the ‘ideal’ is for a field to be clear of any organism except the crop that is to be grown).

Other things just sparked off some ideas: the image of Johnny Appleseed being the Americanised version of Dionysus, memes as cultural genes (by no means a new idea, but I’m tickled, especially considering my recent study of biology), explicit reference made to witch’s ‘broomsticks’ but not what sorcerers used to deliver their hallucinogenics and, of course, the idea of tulips being a phallic symbol. This last one cracks me up so much.

Interesting factoids include that the clincally depressed show no appreciation of flowers, that the period when flowers and fruit began to appear in plants was referred to by Darwin as ‘an abominable mystery’, and that every apple seed is so vastly different from it parent genetically that it is highly unlikely you could get an edible apple from a tree born from any one seed.

I feel sorry for the marijuana plants grown in hot houses, being forced to flower continually.
The label biotechnology being applied to cheese making baffles me, although I can understand why someone could do so.
That a plant could cause any potential eaters to burn in the sun is scary.
I have intense admiration for the organic farmer the author visited when he was researching potatoes. Micro-organisms SHOULD be in the soil. (And here I angrily shake my fists and go “THIS is why your child is allergic to a hundred foods under the sun”.

Malthus, the political economist, is mentioned in regards to potatoes and how ‘easy food’ disturbs the economic balance. In general, I like his ideas, but when he was mentioned here, my immediate thought was that potatoes should be banned in an effort to keep the world’s population under control. (Easy food = people are ‘fitter’ = more people.) Probably a bit over-Malthusian reaction…

I have already mentioned that there is a type of tulip named Semper Augustus and there are Triumphs, but I have not mentioned that the author’s description of a marijuana growers convention as what you would expect of gardeners in the off-season; swapping seeds and stories and new techniques and showing off beloved plants; and how that description amuses me so. (Mostly because of this one IchiIshi AU fic where Ryuuken was a gardener and was distracted by a mention of an orchid in a hotel foyer.)

Ummm, yes. Interesting read. You get to find out a bit more about apples, tulips, marijuana and potatoes. Fun.