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Re: Africa's shrinking savannas Dr. Juliet prior, project coordinator
I am most deeply impressed, and very, very much pleased to see such work
done. I envy you the opportunity.
What a pity Wendy Campbell-Purdie did not live to see this work done. She
put in so much effort, and could have profited so much from the info
given. She wrote around all over for info on Acacia , Euc, etc., and did
the best she could with what little info she could dredge up.
I am so sorry to see Eucalyptus used for reforestation. Even in
Madagascar, where there are so many marvelous species, I hated to see
expanses of Euc forests. They are so allelopathic, and their shallow roots
spread so greedily, so far.
Acacias are not nearly so bad.
Mention of proline intrigues me. It is one of the proteins that give
frost protection to plants. I have not yet found out how and why. I know
that in cold climates the fatty acids in membranes alter to have more
bonds, so the "crooked" fatty acids take more "space" and permit of more
mobility as cold weather starts.
(I was permitted to copy some of the fatty acids sketches involved,
>from Udo Erasmus, and what he wrote gave me the clue that I had been
struggling to find, to explain in my ORGANIC METHOD PRIMER UPDATE, [pg
116] and the subsequently published ORGANIC METHOD PRIMER--THE BASICS,
[pg 30] and which sketches he permitted me to copy.)
I just wonder if there could be some similar explanations for the drought
resistance. If molecules in the cell membrane can take necessary action in
temperate climate plants, that tropical climate plants don't "know how to
do", and therefore freeze to death, could there be a parallel intrigue for
arid climate plants?
Does any of the arid land to be studied extend to actual sea shores, where
Cauarina could be utilized for its N-fix? They can send taproots down as
far as 10 m, a quote on pg 23 of the BASICS., taken from Ntl R. Council
book on the tree.
Your remarks about the deep tap roots of trees makes me smile, because, in
trying to get data for the PRIMER, I wrote to the top authority in the US
Forestry Dept, and was disappointed to learn that foresters apparently
consider that trees , if they actually do sometimes have tap roots, could
not have them any longer than about 5 ft.
I think that the trouble is that the landscape,nursery,garden writers
continuously spread the word that trees don't have taproots. I have
figured out the reason I think is responsible for that falsity--they all
work with plants started in commercial nurseries, where the seedlings are
shoved into pots, the taproots broken right at the start, and so the poor
trees, when planted, already depend on near-surface roots, and from them,
"sinker roots".
You mention leaf effect in heat. Could tepary bean be used in understory,
with its ability to thrive where other beans fail, due partly to "smaller,
thinner heaves that track the sun, angling the leaves from perpendicular
to parallel (to sun rays), and thus slow transpiration loss? [pg142,
Primer UPDATE]
Thank you so much for the very valuable information you have given. Would
it be possible to get further reports, as they come?
B. Rateaver
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