Grain
Back in West Virginia (when I was 'young'), a big part of my fun was seeing how much of our diet came directly from the farm. When I made pancakes, I knew I had produced the milk, the butter, and the maple syrup. But I didn't produce the flour. At that point, growing grains seemed an impossibility.
It wasn't until I moved up to Maine and started using winter rye as a cover crop that I learned otherwise.
One spring, I was in a hurry, and did a poor job of turning under the winter rye before planting peas. The peas came up, and so did the rye. I muttered something about fixing it later, and ran on past to the next task. I also never got around to staking the peas, so actually the rye came in handy to hold them up.
The payoff came when I harvested the peas and realized that I also had rye- my first grain- there for the taking. The light bulb slowly flickered on in my head and I realized maybe I could indeed grow grains.
(On a side note(which should technically be posted under garden veggies), after several years of growing oats with seeds such as clover or field peas undersown, I am now using 'Jerry' oats to plant with field peas *and* garden peas. You broadcast both. The peas climb up the oats. You sow in beds the right size to pick from both sides. You don't have to stake the peas because the oats are there. You can pick the peas green. it was last year (2012) that I discovered if you leave the peas to dry and then pull then entire stalk, it leaves the oats behind and then you can sickle them to harvest as well. (It worked with field peas. This year i am trying 2 more varieties of dried whole soup peas, and 2 varieties of garden peas. They look 'OK' as of 6/17/13)
It wasn't until I moved up to Maine and started using winter rye as a cover crop that I learned otherwise.
One spring, I was in a hurry, and did a poor job of turning under the winter rye before planting peas. The peas came up, and so did the rye. I muttered something about fixing it later, and ran on past to the next task. I also never got around to staking the peas, so actually the rye came in handy to hold them up.
The payoff came when I harvested the peas and realized that I also had rye- my first grain- there for the taking. The light bulb slowly flickered on in my head and I realized maybe I could indeed grow grains.
(On a side note(which should technically be posted under garden veggies), after several years of growing oats with seeds such as clover or field peas undersown, I am now using 'Jerry' oats to plant with field peas *and* garden peas. You broadcast both. The peas climb up the oats. You sow in beds the right size to pick from both sides. You don't have to stake the peas because the oats are there. You can pick the peas green. it was last year (2012) that I discovered if you leave the peas to dry and then pull then entire stalk, it leaves the oats behind and then you can sickle them to harvest as well. (It worked with field peas. This year i am trying 2 more varieties of dried whole soup peas, and 2 varieties of garden peas. They look 'OK' as of 6/17/13)
1 Spelt
Spelt is not a shy or retiring grain. it has a way of getting your attention. I first grew spelt by accident. I had bought some triticale (a wheat/rye cross) to plant as a winter grain. As it grew the following spring, I did not notice anything unusual. At harvest time, I went through with a sickle. I was bundling the sheaves, when I realized that I had a few heads of something very different in my hand. The grains were nearly twice as long and three times as big around. Unlike tritiicale, which is awned, this grain was awnless, and was a different color. I stopped cutting, and started looking. The unusual grain was sparse in number compared to the intended growth of triticale. but the stalks were a full head taller than the surrounding grain. I harvested every one I could, dried and kept the seed, but had no idea what it was.
Meanwhile, as part of my earth oven and sourdough baking operation, I had bought both spelt flour and spelt grain. I liked the spelt flour OK for cooking, and so tried planting some of the grain in the spring.
It turns out most spelt is a fall grain, so I didn't get any grain heads. But a few of the plants re-sprouted in the spring, and I watched to see what they would do. In the mean-time, I had learned from the failure of my trial planting to seed, and had bought some spelt to plant as fall grains. Alongside them I planted my 'unknown' seeds harvested from the triticale patch.
The following summer, I had my answer. My unknown was in fact spelt.
So far, it does grow for me, sparsely. I am not up to speed on the grain growing operation anyway, still negotiating with fertility, weed suppression, rodents, and wild turkeys. (God help me if the deer decide they want it too.) I have also to contend with the fact that spelt has a tough hull which requires extra processing to remove.
But the grain is sublime for baking. I now bake with 50% spelt flour, 50% unbleached white flour, +/- other additives. The taste, aroma, crumb, nutritious characteristics, and digestibility all outperform for me. My preference is to grind it here on the farm and use it fresh, rather than buying the flour. At this time, because of production and processing issues, that means buying the whole grain from another source. But it continues to be a huge motivator. 30% of my winter grain planting in fall of 2011 was spelt.
Meanwhile, as part of my earth oven and sourdough baking operation, I had bought both spelt flour and spelt grain. I liked the spelt flour OK for cooking, and so tried planting some of the grain in the spring.
It turns out most spelt is a fall grain, so I didn't get any grain heads. But a few of the plants re-sprouted in the spring, and I watched to see what they would do. In the mean-time, I had learned from the failure of my trial planting to seed, and had bought some spelt to plant as fall grains. Alongside them I planted my 'unknown' seeds harvested from the triticale patch.
The following summer, I had my answer. My unknown was in fact spelt.
So far, it does grow for me, sparsely. I am not up to speed on the grain growing operation anyway, still negotiating with fertility, weed suppression, rodents, and wild turkeys. (God help me if the deer decide they want it too.) I have also to contend with the fact that spelt has a tough hull which requires extra processing to remove.
But the grain is sublime for baking. I now bake with 50% spelt flour, 50% unbleached white flour, +/- other additives. The taste, aroma, crumb, nutritious characteristics, and digestibility all outperform for me. My preference is to grind it here on the farm and use it fresh, rather than buying the flour. At this time, because of production and processing issues, that means buying the whole grain from another source. But it continues to be a huge motivator. 30% of my winter grain planting in fall of 2011 was spelt.
Wheat
Heritage Wheats
Emmer Einkorn
2013; second year planting emmer; both years I have done parallel planting of emmer seed from Eli Rogosa, and that from small Valley Grains. It grows- I will say that- but I don't yet have sufficient results to determine the practicality for this farm. I am hindered by threshing technology as summer is so busy that I have a bottleneck in processing. Many years I end up with shocks in storage in a grain crib still waiting to be thresed and winnowed the following year- 'just in time' inventory, as it were. Last fall I threshed out triticale and a few other grains 'just in time' to plant them. I need a better system.
Rye Triticale Oats Barley Buckwheat Amaranth Quinoa Flax Millet
Note in 2013; June 17th- the 2nd year of planting 'Robust' barley along side 'black barley'. I shall try to post a picture (easier now with my smart phone). , the black barley grows well for me, and is a spectacular looking plant. It was suggested in the research that I performed after buying the seed, that the yield is relatively low- but since I am in the very early stages of learning to grow grains and using primitive techniques, yield is not so much of a quantitative issue at this time. I am in the stages of seeing whether or not a pound of seed planted yields more than a pound of seed harvested. With fiber flax for example, I was overjoyed last year when a pound of seed yielded stems to process into flax plus *2* pounds of seed- and then when mice ate my commercial seedstock, I was very happy indeed to find out this spring that my harvested seed is viable. It is admittedly a slow process..
Sorghum http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sorghum
When I was placing my seed order to Fedco this year (2012), I came across 'black sorghum'. While i was pondering 'to order or not to order?', I looked it up in Wikipedia (hence this link. I found the table below, which I saved as a PDF. If you don't have Adobe Acrobat, go to the Wikipedia article and see it there. I couldn't figure out how to save it into a spreadsheet, unfortunately. (note in 2013)- now the second year attempting to cultivate this- the germination is miserable. I got a few seedheads last year out of several rows. This year I companion planted a(n) ('ornamental') spring triticale in the same rows- and again I see maybe 10 stalks of sorghum from perhaps 100 seeds planted. Broom corn does much better. If I can get other varieties of sorghum to trial, I shall move on..
Note in 2013; June 17th- the 2nd year of planting 'Robust' barley along side 'black barley'. I shall try to post a picture (easier now with my smart phone). , the black barley grows well for me, and is a spectacular looking plant. It was suggested in the research that I performed after buying the seed, that the yield is relatively low- but since I am in the very early stages of learning to grow grains and using primitive techniques, yield is not so much of a quantitative issue at this time. I am in the stages of seeing whether or not a pound of seed planted yields more than a pound of seed harvested. With fiber flax for example, I was overjoyed last year when a pound of seed yielded stems to process into flax plus *2* pounds of seed- and then when mice ate my commercial seedstock, I was very happy indeed to find out this spring that my harvested seed is viable. It is admittedly a slow process..
Sorghum http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sorghum
When I was placing my seed order to Fedco this year (2012), I came across 'black sorghum'. While i was pondering 'to order or not to order?', I looked it up in Wikipedia (hence this link. I found the table below, which I saved as a PDF. If you don't have Adobe Acrobat, go to the Wikipedia article and see it there. I couldn't figure out how to save it into a spreadsheet, unfortunately. (note in 2013)- now the second year attempting to cultivate this- the germination is miserable. I got a few seedheads last year out of several rows. This year I companion planted a(n) ('ornamental') spring triticale in the same rows- and again I see maybe 10 stalks of sorghum from perhaps 100 seeds planted. Broom corn does much better. If I can get other varieties of sorghum to trial, I shall move on..
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