Growing Wheat For The First Time

It has been really interesting to growing wheat for the first time, with quite different needs while growing and quite labour intensive to harvest, thresh and clean. But is it worth it?

I used to assume that it would not be worth the effort to grow wheat at a small scale, but then I was given a batch of mixed seed as part of a really interesting seed saving project.

[a-a-ron]

You could look at this as energy per square meter, 1 pound of wheat = 1500 calories.
1 pound of most vegetables is between 50 & 90 calories.
1 pound of wheat = to 23 pounds of cucumbers

[RamiJames]

We have a field behind our house where they plant wheat sometimes. I love sitting near it and listening to the wind. It sounds like the ocean.

[RovingPunster]

I did this a few years ago. I found it easier to just cut off and reserve the heads in a pair of old pillow cases, and just rolled my car back n forth a few times to loosen and separate all the hulls . . . then I just poured the result in front of a strong fan and into a pail, with the chaff getting blown away.

[PKSkeith]

Just let the chickens harvest and thresh it for you. They seem trustworthy.

[SimpleEarthSelfReliance]

So amazing to see. This is the grain of my region, Swartland here in South Africa. Your methods were pretty creative and effective imo.

[flowergrowersmith]

This is EXACTLY what I've been thinking of doing! I make my own sourdough and have a little mill and grind wheat. Australia is a great wheat growing country too, so following your experience, I will definitely try it. There are some vids on YouTube where people use old food processors for threshing and all kinds of other equipment to process the grain, which could make it less labour intensive. I loved your hen cleaner-uppers too!! GREAT video!!

[beware_the_moose]

I'm finding it hard to work out what you expect to grain from this.

[ronaldbequeath]

As a child, my grandfather would bind wheat into sheaves with a horse drawn binder, they where then set up on groups of 10 to 12 leaving space so air could dry the grain, a sheave was placed over the top in such a way as to place the straw or butts facing the prevailing wind. To see if the wheat was ready to thrash, a few heads where rubbed between the hands, if the chaff came off easily and the grain was firm it was further tested by eating it and if crunchy but would form like a gum without to much effort it was ready. Sometimes we would use a flail, two straight branches one 4 feet long and the other 3 feet long tied together with a leather cord and then beat the stocks on a tarp. After the grain had fallen off the straw was raked off and then it was tossed into the air, grain falling to the tarp and chaff blowing away. Hope you liked growing wheat, non gmo is great to make whole wheat and multi grain sour dough or plain bread. Which can be cooked in a dutch oven over a fire.

[ericschmidt]

Very interesting and informative, as a person who was looking to understand more about how wheat is grown. Maybe it's something I could try to grow someday.

[Nathan-ftif]

This video answered all my questions I had about growing wheat. Thank you. Its channels like this that we need more of

[jordanwj]

I appreciate you man!!!
It’s super awesome how you blaze trails for other DIYers — super impressive and impeccably beneficial. 🙏🏼

[fxm]

I love baking bread, and the idea of planting an intermixed variety and letting the local climate select for the most suitable is very appealing. I've got more land than I can use for my vegetable garden, and I have let large portions of it turn to meadow. I think you may have inspired me to try wheat for next season. Plus, I don't feel compelled to build raised beds for grains!

[torkaumbra]

Wheat is also a great cover crop, its a good crop to grow when starting a bed for a new plant.

[niallwildwoode]

I'm in Cumbria, and have notice the price of bread jumping up substantially. With the war in Eastern Europe and climate challenges in the US and Canada, wheat's potentially going to be harder to source. I was with friends last night who grow most of their food as I do, and we reckoned it's time to look at growing our own bread. Thankyou for your insights and starting our journey into this.

[zakf]

I need so many more videos like this. I very much enjoy the intellectual dialogue in your videos. As an avid gardener it's very refreshing to stumble upon a channel like yours.

[Jason-kgrs]

Thanks for this, as usual a very thoughtful analysis. I have wanted to do our own wheat for a while but we just do not have the space. The upside to being able to grow you own wheat is avoiding all the pesticide and fertilizer exposure that come with store bought grain products.

[johncourtneidge]

Six inches from my left elbow is a book called 'Growing Wheat on a Small Scale'. There's a long story attached to this book.

Ps

For two autumns recently, I broadcast sowed a Winter Green Manure mix of Grazing Rye and Winter Tares.

Your lovely video encourages me to let that grow to maturity some day.

[JoseMerino-xnzw]

I love your commentary you are awesome thanks bro.

[gsmscrazycanuck]

great video. I have been growing grains all my life and small plot varieties for almost twenty years.

[timyates]

Im really glad you decided to experiment and more importantly you shared your finds and the figures you came up with give a great framework to start with . being the first video ive seen i appreciate the way you included your sq ft and figures, great overall video i picked up a lot . thank you