"Undomesticated plants could help their farmed cousins adapt to climate stresses, but that requires tracking them down around the world while also “decolonizing botany.”"
"Walk through the New York Botanical Garden in the Bronx, past the exotic orchids, blossoming bougainvillea, swaying grasses and a patch of pristine forest like the one that was here when the Dutch arrived in the 17th century, and you’ll likely miss the most significant plants in the place. Scattered amidst the displays of boisterous and fragrant vegetation, in one of the most celebrated plant collections in North America, are the wild relatives of our most important food crops.
In their untamed form, they’re barely recognizable as in the same family as the fruits and vegetables on our dinner plates. But there they are—the crenellated leaves with little yellow flowers in the genus of Brassica, progenitor of broccoli, bok choy, brussel sprouts, turnips and cabbage; the fernlike leaves of the Juglans genus of walnuts, pecans and hickory nuts; and even a couple of short, wild banana trees. They may not look familiar, but scientists are discovering that many of them have characteristics that are critical to the survival of crops facing the tumultuous shifts in growing conditions triggered by climate change. Only a fraction of the wild relatives of food crops have been collected in any systematic way, but the hunt is on for them as plant scientists come to understand the important reservoirs of genes they possess from the mere fact of having survived so many seasons of changing conditions.
Many of us humans have cousins or aunts or uncles who may not conform with the rest of the family, who embarked on a different path, and yet are part of our family’s fabric—our “wild relatives.” The same thing exists in the world of plants. From the grasslands of the Midwest to the Eastern seaboard, from the mountains of Central Asia and Mexico to the dry gulches of Arizona come the undomesticated family members of the plants we have tamed as food. But they remain wild, out there growing on their own, evolved to ecosystems that may be far away from the fields where their domesticated cousins are cultivated to feed us. They haven’t been propped up with pesticides or weaned on fertilizers. They have adapted."
Mark Schapiro reports for Inside Climate News August 28, 2022.
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