Friday, April 09, 2010

Pineapple?

This deformed take on the familiar is known in Venezuela's gran sabanna as a Fox Pineapple apparently. I was told it was a wild relative of the pineapple which is believable enough and the sort of thing the Agricultural Biodiversity Weblog gets (rightly) very excited about.

fox pineapple

I haven't really been able to find out anymore about it. 2 species of Ananas are apparently known from Venezuela: A. lucidus and A. parguazensis but I haven't found pictures of either online. Ananas cosmosus (the greengrocer's pineapple) is also widely grown - here's one below - which confuses things further.

domestic pineapple

I wonder if the top plant above is a feral seedling of cultivated pineapple but as I didn't take any other photos I'll probably know. The name fox pineapple comes from the fact that they are much beloved of foxes according to my guide for what it is worth.

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