Blueberry Kingdom

 

 

Growing-up as a kid blueberries were a seasonal treat. And my recollection is that most of them came from Michigan.

Nowadays, blueberries are available virtually year-round. And they come from South America; mostly Peru.

Carlos Gereda was the spark that lit Peru's blueberry boom of the past decade. He asked a simple question: "Can blueberries grow in Peru?"

In 2006, he brought 14 varieties from Chile to see which ones adapted well to the Peruvian climate. He narrowed it down to four and, in 2009, founded Inka's Berries. The company's service consisted of assisting the development of plantations that adhered to the growing standards Carlos had conceived. The blueberry revolution ensued.

As a consequence of Peru's coastal location along with a wide selection of growing elevations blueberries can be grown all year long. Peru is now the the world's second largest supplier of blueberries.

Mutant

I picked this today from my cherry tomato plant.

 

A conjoined (Siamese) tomato.  Remarkably a threesome with a single common stem.

The interweb tells me that this can be caused by any number of things - mutation of developing cells, a viral or bacterial infection, or mite or insect attacks.

I ate it and it was delicious.

If I grow a third arm I'll report-back.....

And More Buckaroos

The rut is kicking it into high gear now and the chase is on as male whitetails have romance on their minds.

There's been plenty more daylight deer activity so it's appropriate to share some more buck and doe photos.

Including a mutant!

Freak of Nature

From the trail camera round-up on Sunday - check this out...

Does this buck have three antlers?

The Human Genome

I learned something today.

Single-nucleotide polymorphism.

A variation in a single base pair in a DNA sequence.  Often referred-to as SNPs (pronounced “snips”), are the most common type of genetic variation among people. Each SNP represents a difference in a single DNA building block, called a nucleotide.  There are roughly 10 million SNPs in the human genome.

Freak Show at the Platz

click image to examine it more closely

Yup - a rabbit with three years. 

One picture of several captured on a trail camera last week.

Someone from Sturgeon Bay submitted a photo of a rabbit with four ears that was published in the March 19^th edition of the Door County Advocate.  It would appear that the peninsula is home to a mutant form of cotton tail rabbit that is well-endowed in the ear department.

Are all of the ears functional?  If so, is a rabbit with multiple ears endowed with extrasensory hearing powers?  With the prolific breeding that is found in rabbits are there more of them?  Inquiring minds want to know.

A rabbit with multiple ears has also been found in California and you can see a video of it here- http://www.maniacworld.com/four-eared-rabbit.html

Extra-ears are inherited as a simple recessive trait and is also found in cats.  There is some evidence that the four ears mutation might result in a shortened life expectancy.  In any event the rabbit in the picture above is very much alive and I'm thrilled to be witness to such an oddity.

You can learn more about it here.