The Four Corners potato

My sons came from the highlands of the Andes where one of their main sources of food was the potato, which was, of course, domesticated in that general area.

But I wasn't aware that another type of potato was eaten in North America: Solarum Jameseii, aka the "Four Corners Potato", named for the area where it originally grew.






wild or cultivated? Discussion here.

more here (PDF) about the history and cultivation of the plant.

and that fact is being used to prevent the BearEars area from being opened to those who want to use the land (read oil and gas exploration, etc.)

NYTimes article discusses the controversy (it's actually a new controversy because Obama expanded the area as a "national monument" but now Trumpie boy wants it to go back to it's previous size.) 

Like most western land disputes, it's the greenies vs the locals, with the Native Americans putting their two cents in (since it was originally their land after all).

My take? sustainable and limited development would be the answer: it is a huge area and development is better than living in poverty ("Traditional lifestyle" means living in poverty, something that the city educated Greenies don't seem to notice). But the history of mines/oil drilling etc. destroying the environment here (and in Appalachia) is something I've seen too. (it's more profitable to ignore safe disposal, and don't ignore the human factor carelessness in disposing of toxic wastes).

Sigh.

well, anyway, Atlas Obscura discusses the Four Corners potato, and how locals are trying to encourage traditional food cultivation and for people to incorporate these traditional foods into their diet.



This last part is known to me, because the introduction of western high fat high protein foods (e.g. commodities) not only helped stop the TB/Infectious disease epidemics which thrived on poverty and malnutrition that lowered immunity to disease, but it also induced one of the highest rates of diabetes in the world among Native Americans.

More HERE about the diabetes epidemic.

Hmm... I wonder if Asia will be the next site of the diabetes epidemic: High blood pressure and strokes have always been common in east Asia, because of the high salt diet; this is going down as salt/soysauce/fish sauce consumption is going down (and there are medicines to treat the problem). However,  high fat protein consumption is going up as people get more affluent and can eat more pork (and to a lesser extent, hamburgers).
So now it's common to see fat teenagers here.