慎心堂

Corn sex is complicated . As Michael Pollan observes in The Ominvore’s Dilemma ,” the whole affair is so freakishly difficult it’s hard to image how it ever evolved in the first place . Corn’s female organs are sheathed in a sort of vegetable chastity belt-Surrounded by a tough , virtually impenetrable husk . The only way in is by means of a silk thread that each flower extends, Rapunzel-like , through a small opening . For fertilization to take place , a grain of pollen must land on the tip of the silk , then shimmy it’s way six to eight inches through a microscopic tube, a journey that requires several hours. The result of a successfully completed passage is a single Kernel. When everything is going well , the process is repeated something like eight hundred times per ear , or roughly eighty thousand times per bushel .

玉米的雄雌性難分,當Michael Pollan在Ominvore’s Dilemma 觀查到的整件事是很反常地困難而很難想像剛開始是如何發生的。玉米的雌性器官是包覆在整個堅固難以剝除的外表內。唯一的辦法是用絲線當每個花蕊向外延伸時,透過小小的開放去做施肥,花粉的穀子必須掉進絲線的頂部,而之後透過顯微管做6-8inch的震動，結果就會成功地跑出一個果仁,當一切都進行順利,每個玉米穗重覆進行800次,或是大約每浦式耳8,000次.

It’s now corn-sex season across the Midwest, and everything is not going well. High commodity prices spurred farmers to sow more acres this year, and unseasonable warmth in March prompted many to plant corn early . Just a few months ago , the United states Department of Agriculture was projecting a record corn crop of 14.79 billion bushels. But then , in June and July , came broiling high temperatures ,combined with a persistent drought across much of mid-section of the country .

現在在中西部是玉米的季節,而事情並不如想像中美好.高物價促使農夫今年播種更多,而三月份不合時令的溫暖促使耕種玉米更為早些,在幾個月前,美國農務部提列玉米作物為1千4百7十浦式耳,但在6到7月,炙熱的氣溫加上不斷的乾旱遍佈了中部.

You couldn’t choreograph worse weather conditions for pollination ,Fred Below , a crop biologist at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, told Bloomberg News recently .”It’s like farming in the Hell”Last week , the U.S.DA. officially cut it’s yield forecast by twelve percent ,citing a “rapid decline in crop conditions since early June and the latest weather data” Also last week ,,because of dryness , the U.S.D.A declared more than a thousand counties in twenty-six states to be natural disaster areas. This was far the largest such designation the agency has ever made. In the past month , as the severity of the situation has become apparent , corn prices have risen by more than 40 %.Since so much corn is used to feed livestock ,it’s likely that the increase will translate into higher prices for dairy products and beef-although , as many have pointed out , beef prices were already rising , owing to last year’s devastating drought in Texas.

你無法在壞天氣來進行授粉Fred Below穀物生物學家近來如此告訴彭勃社,這如同是在地獄裏耕種。美國農務部減少了生產預測12%.根據近來天氣資料及6月初指出的穀物生產有急劇的下降,同時上個禮拜,因為乾旱,美國農務部宣佈全美26州為天災區。在過去一個月,如此嚴酷情況明顯發生, 穀物價格已經上升40%,因為很多穀物視作為家禽的飼料,而這又增加了日常用品及牛肉的價格,又許多指出,牛肉的價格已經上漲,因為去年在德州嚴重的乾旱。