From aceska at telus.net Wed Mar 10 19:35:53 2010 From: aceska at telus.net (Adolf Ceska) Date: Wed, 10 Mar 2010 11:35:53 -0800 Subject: [BEN-L]BEN # 422 Message-ID: <000401cac088$e5da61a0$b18f24e0$@net> BBBBB EEEEEE NN N ISSN 1188-603X BB B EE NNN N BBBBB EEEEE NN N N BOTANICAL BB B EE NN NN ELECTRONIC BBBBB EEEEEE NN N NEWS =20 No. 422 March 10, 2010 =20 aceska@telus.net Victoria, B.C. ----------------------------------------------------------- Dr. A. Ceska, P.O.Box 8546, Victoria, B.C. Canada V8W 3S2 ----------------------------------------------------------- UNIVERSITY OF VICTORIA HERBARIUM (UVIC) CLOSED UNTIL AUGUST 31, 2010 From: Geraldine Allen, University of Victoria, Victoria BC, Canada Phone 250-721-7097 email: herb@uvic.ca or gallen@uvic.ca The Herbarium of the University of Victoria will be closed from February = 12 to August 31, 2010, while our building undergoes a seismic upgrade. = Skeleton operations will be continuing in a temporary location on campus (phone, email and mailing address remain the same). Loans may be returned during this period, but the main collection will not be accessible for loans or visits during this time. =20 ALBERTA TAR SANDS IN THE INTERNATIONAL MIRE GROUP CONSERVATION GROUP NEWSLETTER PART 1: PEATLANDS AND OIL SANDS, SHOULD WE BE CONCERNED? by Martha Graf & Line Rochefort = http://www.imcg.net/imcgnl/pdf/nl1001.pdf=20 Canada=92s boreal region is one of the largest intact ecosystems on the planet, containing a quarter of the world=92s frontier forests (Bryant = et al. 1997). It provides habitat for migratory songbirds, waterfowl, bears, = wolves and the world=92s largest heard of caribou. Canada=92s boreal zone is of international importance because it stores more fresh water in its = wetlands and lakes and more carbon in its soils, forests and peat than anywhere = else in the world (Schneider & Dyer 2006). The boreal region of northern = Alberta is described as a mosaic of wetlands and uplands with wetlands making up over 50% of the land base. Of these wetlands, over 90% are peatlands = (Vitt et al. 1996). Peatland complexes are dominated by wooded fens and bog islands (Vitt et al. 1996). Oil sand mining In this same region, oil sands mining development is occuring at an astonishing pace. Since 2000, the industry has expanded significantly, = and production now exceeds one million barrels crude oil per day (Bott = 2000). Approximately 2 tons of oil sand is needed for each barrel of oil. The = total area deemed suitable for surface mining is circa 2500 km 2 and active = mining is occurring on over 250 km 2 (Woynillowicz et al. 2005). When this area = is fully developed, it will probably be the world=92s largest open-pit = mining complex (Schneider & Dyer 2006). Although currently most oil sands mining is occurring in open-pit sites, other mining techniques will become increasingly important in the next decades. Over 80% of the oil sands deposits are deep below the surface = and must be extracted using =91in-situ=92 techniques (Alberta Energy and = Utilities Board 2005). The primary technique used is injecting high- pressure = steam into the underground deposits which liquefies the bitumen so that it can = be piped to the surface (Bott 2000). If all available resources are mined, = the area affected by in-situ mining would correspond to 138,000 km 2 =96 approximately the size of Florida and fifty times larger than that of = the open pit mined area (Schneider & Dyer 2006). Oil sand mining: impact on peatlands The energy sector has been identified as the greatest source of = disturbances to peatlands of boreal Alberta (Forest 2001). Habitat destruction = associated with open-pit mining leaves huge ecological footprints (Figure 1b). To = date, approximately 500 km 2 have been disturbed (Grant et al. 2008). = Thirty-one percent of this landscape is covered by peatlands =96 approximately 155 = km 2 of peatlands thus have been destroyed, which adds up to 0.15% of the disturbed peatlands in Alberta as estimated in 1995 (Vitt et al. 1996). Where pre-mined landscapes are dominated by peatlands, post-mined = landscapes will be dominated by lakes which currently cover 130 km 2 , or 27% of = the post-minded landscape (Grant et al. 2008). These lakes contain water contaminated with higher salinity, naphthenic acids and heavy metals = (Grant et al. 2008). Will peatlands be able to establish in areas with high concentrations of oil sand process affected water? Pilot projects are = being undertaken by the two largest oil companies to =91recreate=92 peatlands = in the post-mined landscape (Graf et al. 2009; Wytrykush et al. 2009). Research = is being conducted by the oil companies to target peatland plants that will tolerate water affected by the mining process. Linear disturbances associated with conventional oil and gas as well as in situ oil sands = mining (i.e. roads, pipelines, seismic lines, power transmission lines) are considered less intensive because they essentially leave the landscape intact (Figure 1c). However, due to the sheer geographical extent of = these disturbances, some believe they have the single largest impact on boreal peatlands of Alberta (Forest 2001). Applications for 924,016 km of = seismic lines were approved between 1979 and 1995, over 88,588 well sites = existed by June 1997, and over 73,103 km of pipeline have been laid by December = 1996 in northern Alberta (Alberta Environmental Protection 1998). The main effects on peatlands caused by these disturbances are 1) fragmentation of the landscape, 2) destruction of habitat, 3) changes to hydrology caused by drainage and compaction, and 4) soil and water contamination from hydrocarbon spills or mineral/clay soils used for construction. The best = way to mitigate these effects is through improved management practices and restoration of affected areas which are no longer in use.=20 Conservation issues=20 Northern Alberta is mainly public land. In 1993 the Alberta Water Resource Commission released a draft policy for managing peatlands in Alberta=92s unsettled area. The unsettled area makes up 53% of Alberta = and contains the majority of the province=92s peatlands. This policy was = never ratified and currently there is no policy for provincial peatland conservation or management in Alberta. The provincial draft policy does = not endorse a =93no net loss of wetland functions=94 principle like the = federal policy does. Alberta Environmental Protection (1994) provided a course guideline for protecting 400 km 2 of peatlands in the oil sands region; however, reserves have not been set up. Vitt et al. (1996) criticize = these conservation guidelines because bogs and fens with internal lawns are underrepresented.=20 These landforms represent high landscape heterogeneity and should be a priority for conservation (Vitt et al. 1996). The vast = majority of disturbed peatlands are not restored. Presently, the Alberta = government does not require decommissioned well sites, roads or pipelines located = in wetlands to be restored back to wetlands (Alberta Environment 1995), and = it will not require this in the near future (Reclamation Criteria Advisory Group, 2008). Creating peatlands in the post-mined landscape of open-pit mining has begun, but will address only a small percentage of the = landscape. While development of the oil sands area is certain, the footprint of = these disturbances could be reduced greatly by improved management practices = and restoration of sites after decommissioning.=20 References Alberta Energy and Utilities Board. 2005. Alberta=92s reserves 2004 and supply/demand outlook 2005-2014, Report ST98-2005. Alberta Environment. 1995. Reclamation criteria for wellsites and = associated facilities: 1995 Update. Available online at: http://environment.gov.ab.ca/info/posting.asp?assetid=3D6855&categoryid=3D= 4 =20 Alberta Environmental Protection. 1994. Report 3 Alberta Protected Areas System Analysis. Alberta Environmental Protection, Natural Resources Service and Protected Area Division, Natural Heritage Planning and Evaluating Branch. Alberta Environmental Protection. 1998. The final frontier: Protecting landscape and biological diversity within Alberta's Boreal Forest = Natural Region. Special Areas Report No. 13. Alberta Environmental Protection, Natural Resources Service and Protected Area Division, Natural Heritage Planning and Evaluating Branch.=20 Bott, R. 2007. Canada=92s Oilsands. Canadian Centre for Energy = Information. Calgary, AB. Bryant, D., D. Nielsen & L. Tangley. 1997. The last frontier forests: ecosystems and economies on the edge. World Resources Institute, = Washington, D.C. Forest, S. 2001. Peatland management and conservation in boreal Alberta, Canada. MSc Thesis from the University of Alberta, Edmonton, Alberta, Canada. Graf, M., J. Price, L. Rochefort and F. Rezanezhad. 2009. Creating = peatlands in the oil sands region of Alberta: Challenges and opportunities. Paper presented in the 34th Annual Meeting and Conference of the Canadian Land Reclamation Association, Quebec City, Qu=E9bec.=20 Grant, J., S. Dyer, & D. Woynillowicz. 2008. Fact or fiction: oil sands reclamation. Pembina Institute. Available online at: http://pubs.pembina.org/reports/Fact_or_Fiction-report.pdf Reclamation Criteria Advisory Group. 2008. 2009 Wellsite reclamation criteria draft for practitioners=92 workshop. Schneider, R. & S. Dyer. 2006. Death by a thousand cuts: Impact of in situ oil sands development on Alberta=92s boreal forest. Pembina Institute.=20 http://www.oilsandswatch.org/pub/1262=20 Vitt, D.H., L.A. Halsey, M. Thormann and T. Martin. 1996. Peatland Inventory of Alberta. Prepared for the Alberta Peat Task Force, National Center of Excellence in Sustainable Forest Management, University of Alberta, Edmonton. Woynillowicz, D., Severson-Baker, C., Raynolds, M., 2005. Oil sands fever: The environmental implications of Canada's oil sands rush. The Pembina Institute, Drayton Valley, Alberta. Wytrykush, C., G.T. McKenna, A.G. Papini, and E.B. Scordo. 2009. Reclamation design for a fen wetland on a tailings sand deposit in northern Alberta. Paper presented in the 34th Annual Meeting and Conference of the Canadian Land Reclamation Association, Quebec City, Qu=E9bec. PART 2: AFTER-WORD ON OIL SANDS AND PEATLANDS by Tatiana Minaeva, International Mire Conservation Mire Group, = Newsletter, Issue 2010/1, January 2010 http://www.imcg.net/imcgnl/pdf/nl1001.pdf=20 If we look at oil sand mining, what do we see? On first view we see disaster. If our Russian oil companies need a green leaf to demonstrate = how =91clean=92 they are, they could compare themselves to companies mining = oil sands in Alberta, Canada. The open mining areas are an ecological catastrophe. Even if you base your assessment only on the promotional = videos of the Canadian Association of Petroleum Producers (http://www.capp.ca/canadaIndustry/oilSands/oil-sands-videos/Pages/Oil-Sa= nds -Tour.aspx#ObTMGDIpNpmM ), the feeling of apocalypse hardly escapes = you. So, what is the problem? First of all the entire destroyed area is really very large. It is unique even in the mining industry that the open cast = mine itself covers 5-15 km 2 and the adjacent destroyed lands 30-40 km 2 . Secondly, the open cast mine covers the entire wetland landscape = starting directly from the Athabasca river bank and spreading through the valley = to terraces and the watershed. Thirdly, we are dealing with the unique situation where a large area of peatland is destroyed without even using = the peat. The only parallel would be construction of infrastructure, but = even there the peat is often utilized. And the size is definitely less. There = is no chance to restore the original peatland ecosystems because of the complicated hydrology of the landscape shaped by thousands of years of sedimentation processes. We are not just looking at a few raised bogs = here, but at a mosaic of bogs and fens and shallow forested peatlands. And finally, the scale of impact of hundreds of square kilometres of bare mineral soil particularly on mesohydrological processes has not been evaluated and is not understood. The new landscape replaces the = complicated mosaic of deep and shallow peatlands, streams, mineral upland forests = etc. The water flow from watershed to river is severely interrupted in a = stretch of 60-90 km along both sides of the Athabasca River. All these problems come combined with a complicated Canadian = legislation, with a land use decision making tool that depends on plenty of = conditions hardly connected to environmental conditions and consequences. Project = cycle design, regulations and conservation should specifically also address peatlands.=20 The lakes that are created by open cast mining are not restoration objects. These lakes are mainly created to store water in = order to reuse it in the extraction process. But why must these toxic ponds be situated so close to the river? At present the water quality will not = allow terrestrialisation by peat formation.=20 Currently, the =91restoration=92 practice for open cast mining areas entails filling up with left-over sand, = levelling and planting trees =96 a far cry from the natural mosaic of peatlands, paludified lands and dry forest lands.=20 The =91restoration=92 practice for =91in situ=92 mining areas is afforestation which of course does not include = closing ditches as that contradicts the forester mentality. The Canadian compensation practice in this case focuses on wetlands and = does not include peatland as a separate compensation object. It allows compensation of one type of water object by any other type. A lost creek = can be compensated by an artificial lake. One company created a lake to =91replace=92 a peatland with 8 m peat depth. Nonrecognition of = peatlands as valuable ecosystems is of course a general problem worldwide. Peat use = is not an issue for the oil companies. Some of the peat is stored for use = as surface soil in restoration projects, but it is unclear how much is = treated as waste. It is thus impossible to calculate the peat turnover and = carbon balance. The integrated climate effect of oil sands should besides the direct emissions from combustion, include emissions from land use. The emissions caused by deforestation are reported by Canada under the Kyoto protocol, but the loss of soil organic carbon (peat) is not included in = this conversion from =91forest land to other land=92. Also emissions from the = drained peatlands for in-situ operations and tailing ponds in open mining should = be included. Oil sands production is economically feasible only if the oil price is above 70 USD. If oil and gas remain the main energy source the importance of the Canadian oil sands will only increase. The area of the deposits is huge and so is the potential area of impact on the boreal peatland-forest landscape. Companies are spending large sums of money on mitigation and restoration measures. The question remains whether appropriate knowledge exists with the responsible scientists. = Comprehensive understanding of ecosystem functions and services is needed where in contrast the restoration objects are usually as small as the budget and = the outcome often dictated by economic interests or by the oil companies themselves hiring the scientists. Mitigation, restoration and = compensation practices can certainly be improved. The first step should be to develop = a national plan for oil sand mining, focussing not only on energy = interests, but addressing wider demands of climate, biodiversity and landscape integrity.=20 BOOK REVIEW: URBAN FLORA OF PORTLAND, OREGON From: Aaron Liston, Oregon State University Herbarium, Corvallis, OR = e-mail: listona@science.oregonstate.edu Christy, J.A., A. Kimpo, V. Marttala, P.K. Gaddis, N.L. Christy. 2009. Urbanizing Flora of Portland, Oregon, 1806-2008. Occasional Paper 3 of = the Native Plant Society of Oregon. 319 pp. ISSN 1523-8520. [softcover]. US = $15. Ordering information: http://www.npsoregon.org/publications.html Don=92t judge this book by its title. The word =93urbanizing=94 is not a = common one, and even if it is familiar to you, reading about the decline of = native plants and their replacement by those adapted to an urban environment = may not strike you as an enjoyable read. Perhaps more attractive is the = prospect of learning about the past 200 years of botanical activity in the = Portland area, and that is the subject of the first 60 pages of this book. Topics include a chronology of botanical exploration in the region, biographies = of the principal plant collectors, and the historic and modern vegetation = and habitats of Portland-Vancouver region. The text is well-illustrated with historical photographs of the city environs and the botanists who = collected here. This section concludes with a thorough analysis of the factors contributing to the historical and ongoing changes in Portland=92s = flora, and provides an excellent perspective on the dynamic interplay between = native and exotic plants in an urban environment. Several well-known plant collectors played important roles in the = botanical history of the region, but the star of this story is Martin Gorman (1853-1926). Gorman=92s profession was accounting, while his passion was botany. He was also a founding member of the Oregon Alpine Club and = Mazamas, and curator of the Forestry Building from 1906-1926. Built for the 1905 Lewis and Clark Exposition, the Forestry Building was a =93hub of = botanical activity=94 during Gorman=92s tenure. Gorman collected about 200 plant = specimens from the Portland area, and most importantly, he wrote several articles = on the region=92s flora, culminating in his List of Plants in the Vicinity = of Portland, Oregon published in 1916 and 1917. Tragically, the botanical journal Muhlenbergia ceased publication before the complete manuscript = was published, and the issue containing the last instalment (over 200 = species) was never distributed! One of the most significant contributions of = Christy et al. is the first publication of Gorman=92s complete species list and = notes (transcribed from the only known original housed in the University of Oregon=92s Knight Library). Gorman=92s information is conveyed in = tabular format, together with other historical and current information. This =93catalog=94 fills 186 pages, and encompasses 1553 native and = naturalized plants known within the same region that Gorman defined: a 15 mile = radius from downtown Portland. One column of the table combines Gorman=92s = text in bold with other historical records (gathered from herbarium specimens = and other publications). A second column summarizes the =93current = condition=94 of each plant including whether it is native or exotic, rare or common, its period of introduction, modern records, and miscellaneous comments. Much fascinating information is contained in this table, and it is an = extremely valuable resource for anybody interested in the plants, and changing = flora, of Portland and the Pacific Northwest.=20 An extensive bibliography and six appendices complete the text. These include a gazetteer, additional excerpts from Gorman=92s papers = containing many observations of historical interest, and lists of 580 rare native plants, 312 rare exotic plants and 279 ballast plants (it was a popular pastime among Portland area botanists to collect the plants that grew = from the soil used by ships for weight, transported around the globe, and = dumped on the banks of the Columbia River in Portland).=20 The five authors are to be congratulated for producing a valuable = addition to our understanding of the interactions of plants and people in the = Pacific Northwest. They expertly combine historical scholarship with a = comprehensive presentation of the current Portland flora. The floristic treatment is = based on the authors=92 own botanizing, extensive data from herbarium records compiled by the Oregon Flora Project, and several other sources. The = book is an important reference for Oregon and Washington botanists, and = establishes a well-documented baseline for future studies of the region=92s flora. ********************************************* Adolf & Oluna Ceska 1809 Penshurst Rd., Victoria, BC CANADA V8N 2N6 250-477-1211 (home) 250-216-1481 (cell/mobile) BEN archive: http://www.ou.edu/cas/botany-micro/ben/ ********************************************* From aceska at telus.net Tue Mar 16 22:09:54 2010 From: aceska at telus.net (Adolf Ceska) Date: Tue, 16 Mar 2010 14:09:54 -0700 Subject: [BEN-L]BEN # 423 Message-ID: <001201cac54d$068bf670$13a3e350$@net> BBBBB EEEEEE NN N ISSN 1188-603X BB B EE NNN N BBBBB EEEEE NN N N BOTANICAL BB B EE NN NN ELECTRONIC BBBBB EEEEEE NN N NEWS No. 423 March 16, 2010 aceska@telus.net Victoria, B.C. ----------------------------------------------------------- Dr. A. Ceska, P.O.Box 8546, Victoria, B.C. Canada V8W 3S2 ----------------------------------------------------------- WEB PAGE UPDATE: BOTANY BC 2010 - MAY 27-30, 2010 TOFINO From: Elizabeth.Easton@gov.bc.ca The URL for Botany BC 2010 is: http://www.members.shaw.ca/botanybc/ ARMEN L. TAKHTAJAN (1910-2009) From: Nancy R. Morin e-mail: Nancy.Morin@nau.edu [Originally published in the _FNA Newsletter_ 23: 23-24.] Armen Leonovich Takhtajan, one of the greatest botanists of our time, passed away on November 13, 2009, at the age of 99. He was born June 10, 1910, in Shusha, Nagorno-Karabakh, in the Southern Caucasus. He had just published his revised classification, _Flowering Plants_ (Springer, 2009), in which he synthesized his own vast knowledge of plant evolution acquired over 60 years of study and much of the phylogenetic information that had been published in recent years by others. He graduated from the Institute of Subtropical Cultivation in Tbilisi, Georgia in 1932, received his Ph.D. in Leningrad in 1938, and his Dr. Sci. at Yerevan State University in 1943. He was on staff at various institutions in Yerevan until 1949 when he joined the faculty at Leningrad State University (1949 to 1960), after which he joined the staff of the Komarov Botanical Institute of the Russian Academy of Sciences, where he was director from 1976 to 1986. Despite great personal and professional risk, he was a strong opponent of the theories of T. D. Lysenko, who had the support of Stalin and Krushchev in banning all teaching of genetics from the 1930s to the 1960s. He was one of the few scientists who travelled internationally during Soviet times and was an important conduit in bringing the ideas of current research in the west to his colleagues in Russia. With his wife Alice, he spent many happy and productive months as a guest researcher at Missouri Botanical Garden, the New York Botanical Garden (with his great friend Arthur Cronquist), and the National Tropical Botanical Garden in Kauai working on his publications. They were an inspiration and a delight to the staff and students at those institutions. He was an Academician of the Armenian Academy of Sciences and of the Russian Academy of Sciences, and a foreign associate of the U.S. National Academy of Sciences, as well as of many other countries. He wrote 20 books and more than 300 scientific papers, many of which were ground-breaking, from his 1943 paper _Correlations of Ontogenesis and Phylogenesis in Higher Plants_, in which he unveiled his theories on macroevolution as a result of changes in developmental timing, through to his books _Floristic Regions of the World and Diversity and Classification of Flowering Plants_. In his foreword to _Flowering Plants_, Peter Raven wrote: "Professor Armen Takhtajan, a giant among botanists, has spent a lifetime in the service of his science and of humanity. As a thoroughgoing internationalist, he promoted close relationships between botanists and people of all nations through the most difficult times imaginable, and succeeded with his strong and persistent personal warmth. He also has stood for excellent modern science throughout this life and taught hundreds of students to appreciate the highest values of civilization whatever their particular pursuits or views, or the problems they encountered." Armen Takhtajan was also an artist and a philosopher. Especially after he retired, he enjoyed staying in his country house and painting. He published (in Russian) a book on systems in general, including organismal systems and political systems. Professor Takhtajan was predeceased by Alice, his wife of 58 years, in 2005; he is survived by his sons Leon and Souren, daughter Lena and many grandchildren. Funeral rites were held at the Komarov Botanical Institute November 19, 2009. [Editorial note: Following Prof. Takhtajan's study visit to the New York Botanical Garden, The New York Times published an excellent article. I asked the NY Times for permission to post it in BEN, but the fee for doing that would annihilate the entire BEN operating budget. I recommend that you access this article directly from the New York Times archives: William K. Stevens. Scientist at Work: Armen Takhtajan; Botanist Plans Survey of World's Flowers // The New York Times. - April 6, 1993 http://www.nytimes.com/1993/04/06/science/scientist-at-work-armen-takhtajan- botanist-plans-survey-of-world-s-flowers.html?pagewanted=1 ] BOOK REVIEW: HISTORY OF PLANT BREEDING From: Dr. Barry Mendel Cohen, 239 Hibiscus Court, Brownsville, TX 78520 drbarry44@hotmail.com Kingsbury, Noel. 2009. _Hybrid: The History and Science of Plant Breeding._ University Of Chicago Press, Chicago, IL. 512 p. ISBN-13: 978-0226437040 [hard cover] Price: US$ 35.00 Noel Kingsbury, the author of _Hybrid_, is a prolific British writer on landscape and kitchen gardening. For him this has become an ever more serious endeavour, and hence the current book. Along with his colleague, Tim Richardson, he has chaired a monthly series of lectures, the _Vista Lectures_, for London's Museum of Garden History, some of which are available via Mr. Kingsbury's Website in podcast form or via his host, the Gardens Illustrated Magazine. These forums became ever more social and political in content, leading Mr. Kingsbury to undertake this current project. It has a wide scope and he is extraordinarily successful in covering it. Rarely do book jacket authors truly capture the essence of the book they describe, but here the anonymous editor aptly remarks, "Starting his story at the birth of agriculture, Kingsbury traces the history of human attempts to make plants more reliable, productive, and nutritious-a story that owes as much to accident and error as to innovation and experiment. Drawing on historical and scientific accounts, as well as a rich trove of anecdotes, Kingsbury shows how scientists, amateur breeders, and countless anonymous farmers and gardeners slowly caused the evolutionary pressures of nature to be supplanted by those of human needs... . He reminds us that contemporary controversies over the Green Revolution and genetically modified crops are not new; plant breeding has always had a political dimension." The author begins with pre-agricultural history and then the historical origins of agriculture. He is particularly strong in this area, following N. I. Vavilov's theory on the centers of origin of cultivated plants as modified by Dr. Jack R. Harlan. He also includes some recent updating of the theories by the British scholars, T. Williams, J. Holden and J. Peacock based on _Genes, Crops, and the Environment_. However, I am mystified why Harlan's _Crops and Man_(1992) is cited rather than the _Living Fields_ by Harlan from 1995. My speculation is that Kingsbury preferred a slightly more technical treatment of the subject in this case. Throughout the book, Kingsbury discuses the origin and development of corn (maize). According to Kingsbury, corn "bears less resemblance to its native ancestors than any other edible plant... ." He recounts the historical debates between the corn expert Dr. Paul Mangelsdorf and the future University of Chicago president (1961-68) Dr. George Beadle. Eventually Dr. Beadle's theory was to prevail that corn was indeed a descendent of teosinte rather than a "tripartite" derivation as Dr. Mangelsdorf suggested. Yet this was true scientific debate and a dignified discussion of scientific issues, and surely dissimilar to the heated Lysenko controversy, especially the part dealing with hybrid corn. With Lysenko on the ascent in December, 1936, the Soviet Union held the first of three major debates on the nature of genetics. During this first debate Vavilov pointed out that some 5% of corn in the United States was already sown with F1 hybrid corn that had 15-20% higher yield than the parent varieties. Lysenko replied that this meant that 95% were not and urged the Soviet Union to continue to rely on non-hybrid corn source. Vavilov was speaking for the future: within thirty year nearly all corn in North America was sown with F1 hybrid stock, even though the farmers had to buy fresh seed every year. The issue was similar to the Green Revolution and modern genetically modified foods. Kingsbury revisits these issues when discussing Norman Borlaug's Green Revolution and the current debates over genetically modified foods. He weighs the values of "home grown agriculture" against scientific production. He is critical of too strict control by corporate and government agriculture, but he is also wary of a romantic agriculture that precludes the use of scientific techniques. He is very concerned that business and corporate agriculture has overtaken public research into agriculture. Kingsbury has provided a splendid overview of plant breeding history, and one that appeals for the best and wisest use of agriculture by all sectors of society. BOOK ANNOUNCEMENT: TAKHTAJAN'S NEW _FLOWERING PLANTS_ Takhtajan, Armen. 2009. _Flowering Plants_ 2nd Ed. Springer, Berlin/Heidelberg/ ISBN 978-1-4020-9608-2 [Hardcover] 720 p. Price: US$269.00 Publisher: http://www.springer.com/life+sci/plant+sciences/book/978-1-4020-9608-2 Bookseller: http://www.koeltz.com Originally published by Columbia University Press, 1999, entitled _Diversity and Classification of Flowering Plants_, the current edition is substantially revised and expanded. | This book culminates almost sixty years of Armen Takhtajan's research of the origin and classification of the flowering plants. It presents a continuation of Dr. Takhtajan's earlier publications including _Systema Magnoliophytorum_ (1987), (in Russian), and _Diversity and Classification of Flowering Plants_ (1997), (in English). In his latest book, the author presents a concise and significantly revised system of plant classification (`Takhtajan system') based on the most recent studies in plant morphology, embryology, phytochemistry, cytology, molecular biology and palynology. Flowering plants are divided into two classes: class Magnoliopsida (or Dicotyledons) includes 8 subclasses, 126 orders, c. 440 families, almost 10,500 genera, and no less than 195,000 species; and class Liliopsida (or Monocotyledons) includes 4 subclasses, 31 orders, 120 families, more than 3,000 genera, and about 65,000 species. This book contains a detailed description of plant orders, and descriptive keys to plant families providing characteristic features of the families and their differences. ________________________________________________________________ Subscriptions: http://victoria.tc.ca/mailman/listinfo/ben-l Send submissions to aceska@telus.net BEN is archived at http://www.ou.edu/cas/botany-micro/ben/ ________________________________________________________________