agave
Cattle wander the field like the fogs just offshore. It hovers above the water, like the mists above Zaca Lake's mirror reflection. I disappear from the ocean, as the bus takes me higher up into the heart of campus.
Later, walking to the garden with Biseat, we hear the strangest noise - almost like a lovecall from the bushes. Walking closer, Biseat realizes that it is a quail. I laugh. So much more ease is present now, after my talk yesterday.
The Art ART leaves gifts in the garden in the form of rosepetals and starts. Marley says that he know I will have great fun in the garden this summer, and to keep on things. He has confidence in me.
I won't let him down.
Just got off the phone with Dad. I asked him about the henequen agave ...one species out of 300 worldwide. Agave range all over the world, though 2/3 of them are in the United States and Central America. This one, the henequen, is used for making sisal, a type of rope. It is not the main producer of nectar - that one is the Blue Agave, and when it is fermented it makes the one and only tequila (it is only grown in Jalisco). Dad says that the henequen are cultivated - they're sterile, as a result. I asked him about how they are propagated, and he told me.
Henequen reproduce in one of two ways: either a flower grows from a leaf, in a bulge called a bulbul (very uncommon) or it sends our rhizomes and up pops another agave. Now, a farmer will find this young plant - called an hijuelo - when it is no larger than a pineapple, sever the root with a sharp tool, and transplant the young plant - about 30 days later. The farmer lets the hijuelo dry out for a month or so, in order to stress the plant and promote root growth. Did you know that bulbers do the same things with their bulbs, the specialty ones, before they send them out to homes? Isn't that crazy? I guess it explains why the leeks survived so well...
It makes sense, he says. It's because the agave grow in arid climates, so they have to be pretty tough. If they grew in tropical climates and were left out for a month, they'd rot.
Well, anyway, then I asked Dad if it means that all the henequen plants are identical. He said not necessarily. He explained that you can take two species that reproduce sexually (i.e. seeds) and cross-breed them, and there will still be some genetic diversity amongst the resulting henequen population. This confused me, so he made an analogy that if you took 100 people from Ethiopia and 100 people from Taiwan and they had kids, then you would get hundreds of people with different genetic makeup (even the offspring of the same two parents - different sperm and different egg each time), but they would still all be considered Ethiopian-Taiwanese.
When I asked him about the social aspects of the henequen, he could not quite answer me. My guess is, knowing a little about how long it takes for the Blue Agave to flower, that it is time-intensive. The Blue Agave, at least, will take as long as 100 years to flower - and shortly thereafter, it dies. The nectar comes from the heart - the farmers cut it out when the plant is 12 years old. There's a bigger story behind the Blue Agave - as I'm sure you can imagine. Anything - any food, drink, item, or space - that is so highly praised and "valued" in our society must have, at some point, exacted a terrible price on its environment - rather, we put enormous stress on the environment for our own production.
As Dad and I were concluding our conversation - he had been called into the restaurant by a friend - I asked him, "Have you heard of Paul Stamets?" He said yes, he had, the mycologist, right? I told him that Paul Stamets had been one of our speakers for ESLP. With a touch of smile in his voice, he told me that Gary would probably like to hear that. We hung up well.
Then I sat in the kitchen for a while and drank tea with Adam, and let time pass.
Later, walking to the garden with Biseat, we hear the strangest noise - almost like a lovecall from the bushes. Walking closer, Biseat realizes that it is a quail. I laugh. So much more ease is present now, after my talk yesterday.
The Art ART leaves gifts in the garden in the form of rosepetals and starts. Marley says that he know I will have great fun in the garden this summer, and to keep on things. He has confidence in me.
I won't let him down.
Just got off the phone with Dad. I asked him about the henequen agave ...one species out of 300 worldwide. Agave range all over the world, though 2/3 of them are in the United States and Central America. This one, the henequen, is used for making sisal, a type of rope. It is not the main producer of nectar - that one is the Blue Agave, and when it is fermented it makes the one and only tequila (it is only grown in Jalisco). Dad says that the henequen are cultivated - they're sterile, as a result. I asked him about how they are propagated, and he told me.
Henequen reproduce in one of two ways: either a flower grows from a leaf, in a bulge called a bulbul (very uncommon) or it sends our rhizomes and up pops another agave. Now, a farmer will find this young plant - called an hijuelo - when it is no larger than a pineapple, sever the root with a sharp tool, and transplant the young plant - about 30 days later. The farmer lets the hijuelo dry out for a month or so, in order to stress the plant and promote root growth. Did you know that bulbers do the same things with their bulbs, the specialty ones, before they send them out to homes? Isn't that crazy? I guess it explains why the leeks survived so well...
It makes sense, he says. It's because the agave grow in arid climates, so they have to be pretty tough. If they grew in tropical climates and were left out for a month, they'd rot.
Well, anyway, then I asked Dad if it means that all the henequen plants are identical. He said not necessarily. He explained that you can take two species that reproduce sexually (i.e. seeds) and cross-breed them, and there will still be some genetic diversity amongst the resulting henequen population. This confused me, so he made an analogy that if you took 100 people from Ethiopia and 100 people from Taiwan and they had kids, then you would get hundreds of people with different genetic makeup (even the offspring of the same two parents - different sperm and different egg each time), but they would still all be considered Ethiopian-Taiwanese.
When I asked him about the social aspects of the henequen, he could not quite answer me. My guess is, knowing a little about how long it takes for the Blue Agave to flower, that it is time-intensive. The Blue Agave, at least, will take as long as 100 years to flower - and shortly thereafter, it dies. The nectar comes from the heart - the farmers cut it out when the plant is 12 years old. There's a bigger story behind the Blue Agave - as I'm sure you can imagine. Anything - any food, drink, item, or space - that is so highly praised and "valued" in our society must have, at some point, exacted a terrible price on its environment - rather, we put enormous stress on the environment for our own production.
As Dad and I were concluding our conversation - he had been called into the restaurant by a friend - I asked him, "Have you heard of Paul Stamets?" He said yes, he had, the mycologist, right? I told him that Paul Stamets had been one of our speakers for ESLP. With a touch of smile in his voice, he told me that Gary would probably like to hear that. We hung up well.
Then I sat in the kitchen for a while and drank tea with Adam, and let time pass.
posted by Yvea at 7:49 PM
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