Hopefully coming back soon, though probably on an even less frequent basis. Real life business matters, after all… But before that, a commemoration. Sky is lightning hard everywhere here, it’s noisy like there’s a storm front moving, waving around, well not exactly like that but close.

The Four Stone Hearth Blog Carnival, dealing with anthropology and other things human, can be read (44th edition) at Greg Laden’s blog. A wide range of topics, from adaptiveness of morning sickness in pregnant woman to Hip Hop linguistics, taking even a turn into the messes of conservapedia. Seems like there’s nothing as diverse as the human mind…

… Quand on est une mule larguée par son esclavagiste. Déprimant, mais il faut bien une piqure de rappel pour rester bien attentif à ce que peut être la réalité du beau monde moderne.

Up there at Gossamer Tapestry, Circus of the Spineless #36. Insect biased. Strongly insect biased… A side effect of summer coming by? Anyway, another well worth reading edition that you can enjoy there.

You may also go at Earth, Wind and Water, for Festival of the Trees #25. Just there.

Dear BGR readers, please have this late edition from June. The previous BGR (#5) was posted here at A Neotropical Savanna, and July’s edition (#7) will be hosted at A Blog Around The Clock. Now, there’s been plenty of plant things happening during June, and here it is:

• Let’s open the carnival with a very interesting post intersecting botany and astronomy. Coturnix at A Blog Around the clock report about the very first experiments of clockwise scientific investigations. Guess what, it started with a plant… Around the calendar, would we put it, as it was around 1729. But that’s not the whole thing, this post is probably also a must-read if you’re interested in details about how science was working. This historical perspective is nicely emphasized throughout the post. Links suggested are also fine, I recommand taking some time for clocking flowers at the very same place.
• Agro from Midoria explains us with an efficient way to learn plant names and taxonomical information. Mnemosyne (Don’t ask, follow the link!) Proficiency and quick learning, which may also incude some linguistics in case you wish to turn into an expert. Let’s work out a botanical question database… Well, it’s underway, just take Castanea as an example.
• Sarcozona, at Gravity’s Rainbow, is dealing with fence posts. From pines. This is all about differenciating taxa when they turn around each other (yep evolution is dancing that way), and how chemistry sometimes comes into play. If you enjoy gymnosperms, in my o’pinyon, this is what you needles. Check here! But if you’re aiming at pancakes, rather elaborate on her Mulberry Gone Round.
• Happy Housekeeping is suggesting two plant species to include in gardens to increase butterfly visitation. I let you see, there are probably many more worth growing… Let’s compile a list.
• Charlie at 10 000 Birds sends us a long way through UK meadows and gives us a chance to spot orchids, namely the quite charming Common Spotted Orchids and Fragrant Orchid. Two very nice species for sure… And if you like terrestrian European orchids, further links are given. I strongly suggest you to follow the path until fly/bee Ophrys hybrids, it’s worth… everything I know. (hum, maybe I’m biased here, for I never foudn such natural hybrids in the wild…).
• Jeremy at Agricultural Biodiversity is digging questions around the soil richness and woofs or goofs around possible carbon sequestration. Take some time to dig through yourself and vote for science, for there’s still plenty to do. See, European commission is digging in another but necessary direction…
• Bora is also offering some nice and creative fern mixing. Pictures on the top (or desktop?). Could almost be the game to find out about the species IDs… Since these are horticultural taxa, I guess this should not be impossible… So go rush and comment in!
• Okay, let’s go edge now, but that’s still somewhat Berrygoan of some sort… Hobby Lawn Care, a rather specialized plant blog, is offering advice as to how take care of your lawn in the cold winter season around some areas.  My ‘guest’, your guess…
• But let’s turn back to something more Berrygoan frankly. What about plants and philosophy? Michael from Ionian Enchantment has an enchanted post about some news that have been buzzing in the blogosphere: Plants, it turns out, are not nearly as boring as we thought kin altruists, not necessarily kind altruists. And maybe predictions if plant neurobiology would stand up. Maybe… (Please, there aren’t that many other plant posts there, but you may find interest in themes, enjoy your walk through)…

And that’s it folks. Don’t forget to send your submissions to the next BGR before the 25th of this month!

I sincerely apologize for having to delay the coming edition of Berry Go Round. It should be posted soon, say in a day or… three. You all know there’s some real world outside… Well, sometimes the real world is also inside. Anyway, the real world is real, no matter what we think about it.

Berry Go Round #6 will be hosted here at Seeds Aside. Please send your submissions before June, the 25th…

Also, we’re still looking for blogs willing to host the BGR next october, november and further…

Cool title, isn’t it? It comes from the head of the page I’m just going to let you read a quote from in a moment. Remember who has the balls? I just discovered back this book, within a pile of manuscripts I’m lurking through (e.g. involving mating in clonal orchards -ah, pollen flows!). This book, Tropical Nature, by Forsyth & Miyata. The reason I didn’t get the whole thing through at once is that writing style is changing from a chapter to the other, and though it is a great book, it makes me reading at different speeds (and what’s more, I eventually lost the thing in the wrong pile: the non-priority reads). While Bugs and drugs is the chapter’s name, 101 is the page I’m going to quote, you know, so that the blog won’t stay silent for too long… Here we go:

Despite our lack of participation in the evolutionary processes that led to plant secondary compounds in the rain forests of tropical America, our fundamental biochemical kinship with other inhabitants of the area through time allows us to be both victim and beneficiary of this long, silent, ceaseless history. Human use of hallucigenic plants is nothing more than an evolutionary epiphenomenon, an accidental and unpredictable result of our common heritage of neurotransmission with the plant’s real enemies.

No, these aren’t trying to speak to us. Period. Ask a DUI rodent (gosh I was trying to get at a ROUS!).

C’est la saison des retours de bâton candidatures. Joyeuse période pré-estivale qui préside à la réception de courriers agréables et d’un réconfort inestimable. Je n’en fais généralement pas grand cas ici même, où la vie réelle est reléguée à l’esquisse évanescente, mais je ne peux résister à quelques exceptions suivant l’adage fort sage de “l’occasion fait l’hilarant”. Voici donc la formulation lapidaire mais plaisante et digne de génie qu’un gérant des ressources humaines d’une grande université du Sud de la France a jugé susceptible de me plaire (avec raison):

J’ai l’honneur de vous faire connaître que les instances compétentes de l’Université XXX n’ont pas retenu votre candidature sur l’emploi cité. (emphase mienne)

Sans blagues! Ca vous fait honneur, vous, de m’annoncer ce refus? Suis-je prestigieux et indésirable à ce point là? Ou bien ne comprenez vous tout simplement pas ce que vous écrivez?

Huh?! Indeed. Can you imagine how the world would look like if seeds had no way knowing what to grow into? That’s even risky to try: you may grow as a tropical vine where you need to accomodate for a temperate climate!

Seriously. Have you, dear requester, ever heard of DNA? Yep, plants have DNA too.