Jerusalem Artichoke: The Other Perennial Sunflower
Native Americans domesticated the wild perennial sunflower Helianthus tuberosus by selecting individuals with larger tubers. This crop plant (now called by the misleading name Jerusalem artichoke) was grown for its tubers and not for its seed. The perennial sunflowers being developed as an oilseed crop by modern plant breeders may have tubers, but they will probably not be harvested. Digging tubers is probably ecologically sustainable on a small scale. On a large scale, annually disturbing the soil makes it vulnerable to soil erosion. Avoiding annual tillage is one of the main motivations for developing perennial grain crops.
Read more about this topic: Perennial Sunflower, Background
Famous quotes containing the words jerusalem, perennial and/or sunflower:
“Comfort, comfort ye my people, speak ye peace, thus saith our God;
comfort those who sit in darkness mourning ‘neath their sorrows’ load.
Speak ye to Jerusalem of the peace that waits for them;
tell her that her sins I cover, and her warfare now is over.”
—Johann G. Olearius (1611–1684)
“In old persons, when thus fully expressed, we often observe a fair, plump, perennial waxen complexion, which indicates that all the ferment of earlier days has subsided into serenity of thought and behavior.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)
“When van Gogh paints sunflowers, he reveals, or achieves, the vivid relation between himself, as man, and the sunflower, as sunflower, at that quick moment of time. His painting does not represent the sunflower itself. We shall never know what the sunflower itself is. And the camera will visualize the sunflower far more perfectly than van Gogh can.”
—D.H. (David Herbert)