The relationship between agricultural intensification and a decline in farmland bird populations is well documented in Europe, but the results are mostly based on data from the western part of the continent. In the former socialist eastern and central European countries, political changes around 1990 resulted in a steep decline in the intensity of agriculture. Therefore, one would expect populations of farmland birds to have recovered under these conditions of lower agricultural intensity. We explored population trends of 19 farmland bird species in the Czech Republic between 1982 and 2003 using data from a large‐scale monitoring scheme, and, additionally, we looked for relationships between such population changes and a number of variables describing the temporal development of Czech agriculture. Most farmland species declined during the focal period, and this decline was steepest in farmland specialists (Northern Lapwing Vanellus vanellus, Skylark Alauda arvensis, Linnet Carduelis cannabina and Yellowhammer Emberiza citrinella). Although the intensity of agriculture was lower after than before 1990, the overall decline continued in most farmland bird species, albeit at a slower rate. The correlations between agricultural intensity and farmland bird decline showed opposite patterns to that found in other European studies, because bird populations were highest in years with the most intensive agriculture. We speculate that this pattern could have resulted from the impact of different driving forces causing farmland bird decline in different periods. The high intensity of agriculture could have caused the decline of the originally abundant populations before 1990. After 1990, the decreasing area of arable land could be the most important factor resulting in the continued decline of farmland bird populations. Our results demonstrate that the drivers of farmland bird population changes could differ across Europe, and thus investigations into the effect of farmland management in different parts of the continent are urgently required.

Land-use practices have changed markedly in the Czech Republic, and in other central and eastern European countries, during the 20th century (Lipský 1995, Sklenička 2002). In the last few decades in particular, changes in land-use have been accompanied by changes in the extent of all major landscape types. The amount of arable land has declined as fields in montane and submontane areas were abandoned after the Second World War, when three million people were translocated from areas near state borders (Sonka 2002). As a result, forests started to regenerate on these areas (Pokorný et al. 2005). At the same time, cattle grazing was prohibited within the forested areas and the rotation period increased (Konvička et al. 2004). Forest invasion was enhanced during the transformation of the Czech economy starting in 1989; subsidies in agriculture dropped to a minimum thus restricting arable land to highly productive areas (Sklenička 2002). All of these processes have contributed to the maturation of Czech forests during the last decades (Anon. 2005). Although such large environmental changes would be expected to have an effect on bird populations, large-scale studies of population changes in birds in central and eastern European countries are rather scarce. The explanatory power of existing small-scale studies (Wesołowski & Tomiałojc 1997, Stříteský & Krist 2004) is limited, and does not explain population changes of birds at larger spatial scales (Holmes & Sherry 1988). Moreover, results at regional and local

The authors studied an extension of the sources of plant products for the diet in coeliac disease. This disease is induced by the components of glutenin proteins. In a collection of crops, they examined the contents of the total and protein nitrogen, the composition of protein fractions, the electrophoretic composition of reserve gluten and prolamine proteins, and the immunological determination of the gliadin amount using ELISA test. By immunological tests, gliadin content below 10 mg per 100 g of sample was found in the following species: amaranth (Amaranthus hypochondriacus and A. cruentus) followed by quinoa (Chenopodium quinoa), sorghum species – grain sorghum and sweet sorghum (Sorghum bicolor and S. saccharatum), millet (Panicum miliaceum), foxtail millet (Setaria italica ssp. maxima), broadrood (Digitaria sanguinalis) and buckwheat (Fagopyrum esculentum). These species can be considered as suitable for the diet in coeliac disease. Below-limit values were found in triticale (Triticosecale) and some oats varieties; this, however, will need some other tests. The analysed samples differred by the contents of crude protein and fraction structures of the protein complex. In pseudocereals amaranth, quinoa and buckwheat, the proportion of the soluble fractions of albumin and globulin was 50–65%. In grain sorghum, their proportion was 20.5%, in sweet sorghum 7.8%. In millet, foxtail millet, and broadrood, their proportion amounted to 12–13%. The proportion of prolamines was higher in sweet sorghum than in grain sorghum. Pseudocereals and millet contained 3–6% of prolamines, Italian millet 38.7%, and broadrood 23.1%, respectively. The two latter species had, however, lower contents of glutenins. In the other species studied, the contents of glutenins ranged from 12 to 22%. Electrophoretic analysis PAGE of prolamine proteins or SDS-PAGE ISTA, developed for gluten proteins, confirmed the results of immunological tests on the suitability of quinoa, grain sorghum, sweet sorghum, buckwheat, amaranth, broadrood, millet and foxtail millet for the diet in coeliac disease. These species did not contain prolamins or the content of -prolamins was negligible in the given samples. The tested species of wheat, triticale, and oats species were manifested as substandard or unhealthy for the diet.  

Protein composition of the grain storage proteins (evaluation using electrophoresis in polyacrylamide gel – the SDS-PAGE method) and selected parameters of bread-making quality in a set of 6 winter wheat varieties from organic and conventional growing in Central Bohemia (elevation 295 m a.s.l.) were evaluated during a two-year experiment (2004 and 2005). In comparison with the varieties from organic growing, wheat varieties from the conventional growing were characterized by twice the percentage of High Molecular Weight (HMW) glutenins, responsible for dough elasticity (conventional wheat in average 25.22%, organic wheat 12.71%). At the same time, varieties from conventional growing generally reached higher, more positive values of crude protein content and wet gluten content in grain dry matter, sedimentation index by Zeleny and yield of bread. On the other hand, wheat varieties from organic growing were mainly characterized by significantly higher percentage of nutritionally valuable albumins and globulins (organic wheat in average 17.69%, conventional wheat 7.33%). In both systems of growing the highest percentage of HMW glutenins was determined in varieties from the quality group E (elite, the most suitable for bread-making), while the varieties from the quality group C (wheat unsuitable for bread-making) reached the highest percentage of residual albumins and globulins.

Objective: To set up and validate a HS-SPME-GC method useful to measure the hexanal content in baby foods. Materials and Methods Samples.Baby foods based on milk and cereals were used. SPME fibre. Hexanal was extracted using a SPME device with a 85 µm Carboxen on polydimethylsiloxane (CAR/PDMS) StableFlex fibre (Supelco).GC. An Equity 5 capillary column (Supelco; 30 m × 0.53 mm ID × film thickness 5 µm) installed on an Autosystem XL Perkin Elmer GC equipped with a flame ionisation detector (FID) and a split/splitless manual injector were used.Procedure. 4 ml (c.a. 3.8 g) of baby food were sealed in a 10 ml vial with a PTFE/silicone septum. The following analytical conditions were applied: optimisation of a headspace solid Phase Mi Croextraction (hs-s P M e ) Method to determine hexanal in Baby Foods resultsUnder optimal conditions hexanal detection and quantification limits were 0.99 and 3.30 ng/g, respectively. The precision showed a relative standard deviation ranging from 0.86 to 3.11%, depending on the analysed baby food. A good linearity was obtained in the range from 2.6 to 107.7 ng/g added to the sample (y = 0.023x + 0.231; r = 0.998).Acknowledgements: To Hero España S.A. for providing the samples and financial support for this study.