I love this essay about Ozark agriculture and subsistence traditions. Like many areas that are marginal for agriculture (whether due to technological, population, or environmental constraints), the Ozarks encourage alternatives to industrialized agriculture, and in particular create areas of high agricultural biodiversity. Similar things happened in the past, as well, affecting the diversity of both plant and animal species in areas around villages and fields. I'm most familiar with cases from the Americas, and there are just too many to mention. Everyone should read these three books:
Cultivated Landscapes of Native North America, by William Doolittle, Oxford University Press, 2002
Cultivated Landscapes of Native Amazonia and the Andes, by William Denevan, Oxford University Press, 2003
Cultivated Landscapes of Middle America on the Eve of Conquest, by Thomas M. Whitmore, Oxford University Press, 2002
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