#CentralAsia’s #fruit and #nut #forests: the real Garden of Eden?
Birthplaces of some of the world’s most beloved snacks
by Monica Evans
17 December 2020
"Millions of years ago, in the temperate montane forests of a little-known region in Central Asia, some of the world’s best-loved fruit and nut trees began to grow. #Apples, #apricots, #cherries, #plums, #grapes, #figs, #peaches, #pomegranates, #pears, #almonds, #pistachios and #walnuts all originated in the hills and valleys of the #TianShan mountain range, which stretches from #Uzbekistan in the west to #China and #Mongolia in the east.
"The area is volcanic and geologically tumultuous, but fertile – scientists have hypothesized that in a place prone to frequent eruptions, earthquakes and landslides, shorter-lived tree species that could disperse their seeds widely by making themselves palatable to large mammals had a better shot at survival than long-lived, slow-maturing trees.
"And that tasty survival strategy has served these species well. For residents of the region, the foods represent both security and social currency. 'From the taxi drivers to the ministers to the local people, almost everyone carries some #DriedFruit or #Nuts with them,' says Paola Agostini, a lead natural resources specialist for Europe and Central Asia at the World Bank. 'It’s like this safety net, and it’s also a lovely gift: something to share with others that is always appreciated.'
"Central Asian marketplaces offer a cornucopia of colors, flavors, textures and varieties – many more than those most of us are accustomed to finding in our local supermarket’s produce aisle. 'I was always astonished that people in the region could so easily tell which country a particular dried apricot came from,' says Agostini. 'Their knowledge of these products is just so deep.'
"Procuring and sharing these energy-dense treats is an ancient practice in the area. Fruit and nuts were major commodities on the Silk Road, an ancient network of trade routes that tracked through the heart of Central Asia, linking Europe, the Middle East and Asia, from the first century BC through to the mid-1400s. Over centuries of trade and travel – and lots of munching by humans, camels and horses along the way – prized fruit and nut species spread their seeds wider and wider, and new hybrid varieties were created, many of which are now supermarket and home-orchard staples, cultivated enthusiastically in temperate regions across the globe.
"Narratives of plant domestication often tend to overstate the role of humans, but newer science suggests that 'evolution in parallel' with the plants we love is often a more accurate way of framing this process. 'It’s very unlikely that when somebody took an apple from #Kazakhstan and carried it across an entire continent, they were thinking that they could cross it with another variety and end up with something better,' says #RobertSpengler, a paleo-ethnobotanist at the Max Planck Institute in Jena, Germany. 'They were more likely just carrying the seeds to plant somewhere else. And in doing so, they inadvertently set off a chain reaction of hybridization events.'
"According to Spengler’s research into the origins of apples, humans were not the first mammals to participate in that process of dispersal and co-evolution, either. In the late #Miocene, which spanned the period from 11.63 to 5.33 million years ago, large mammals such as #mammoths and #horses played critical roles in dispersing apple seeds and facilitating their evolutionary process into the large, sweet, flavor-rich fruits we enjoy today."
#SolarPunkSunday #Ethnobotany #PlantHistory #SaveTheForests #SaveTheTrees #FruitTrees #NutTrees
