Food
Where does Quinoa come from?
Quinoa isn't a true grain but the seed of a plant related to spinach. It was domesticated thousands of years ago around Lake Titicaca, high in the Andes, and the Incas nicknamed it the 'mother of all grains'.
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Food
Horned melon (kiwano)
📍 Kalahari & southern Africa
The spiky horned melon grows wild around the Kalahari, where it is one of the few sources of water in the dry season. It was the 'African horned cucumber' until the 1980s, when it was renamed kiwano for export from New Zealand.
Food
Maca (root)
📍 Junín plateau (Lake Junín), Peru
Maca, a turnip-like root now sold worldwide as a powder, grows at 4,000 metres, where frost and wind defeat most crops. Until the late 1980s it was farmed only around Lake Junín in central Peru, where it is still roasted in earth pits.
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Food
Peanut
📍 Southern Bolivia & NW Argentina
Peanuts were domesticated in South America, most likely in southern Bolivia or northwestern Argentina, where the most wild-like varieties still grow. The oldest known remains, about 7,600 years old, come from Peru.
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Word
Condor (the word)
📍 Andes, Peru
Condor comes from kuntur in Quechua, the language of the Inca, and reached English through Spanish around 1600. With wings spanning up to 3.3 metres, the Andean condor is one of the largest flying birds in the world.
Nature
Galápagos giant tortoise
📍 Galápagos Islands, Ecuador
Early Spanish explorers named the Galápagos Islands after these giants. The tortoises can weigh over 400 kg and live for more than 100 years, and their differences from island to island fed Charles Darwin's thinking when he visited in 1835.
Nature
Neon tetra (aquarium fish)
📍 Western Amazon (Brazil, Peru & Colombia)
The neon tetra comes from dark blackwater streams of the western Amazon, where Brazil, Peru and Colombia meet. Most neons sold in the US are now farm-raised in Southeast Asia, and their glowing stripes fade to grey at night while they rest.