From Field to Flour: How to Grow Wheat

By Stan Cox
Published on March 24, 2014
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Shocks of wheat cure in a field on a misty morning.
Shocks of wheat cure in a field on a misty morning.
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A handful of spelt berries, ready to be sown.
A handful of spelt berries, ready to be sown.
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A small plot of wheat in your garden can yield a surprising amount of wheat berries.
A small plot of wheat in your garden can yield a surprising amount of wheat berries.
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Don Webb uses a team of Belgian Draft horses and an antique grain drill to plant spelt in Pittston, Maine.
Don Webb uses a team of Belgian Draft horses and an antique grain drill to plant spelt in Pittston, Maine.
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Wheat changing from the
Wheat changing from the "dough" stage to the "milk stage" just before harvest.
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A man chews a wheat berry to see if it's ready for harvest. If it's crisp, it's ready.
A man chews a wheat berry to see if it's ready for harvest. If it's crisp, it's ready.
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A work party harvests a wheat plot on Crabapple Farm in Chesterfield, Mass.
A work party harvests a wheat plot on Crabapple Farm in Chesterfield, Mass.
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A hand sickle can be used to harvest a small plot of wheat.
A hand sickle can be used to harvest a small plot of wheat.
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Rachel Robertson-Goldberg of Crabapple Farm in Chesterfield, Mass., teaches volunteers how to harvest wheat.
Rachel Robertson-Goldberg of Crabapple Farm in Chesterfield, Mass., teaches volunteers how to harvest wheat.
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A treadle-powered thresher speeds processing time for small-scale grain growers.
A treadle-powered thresher speeds processing time for small-scale grain growers.
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You'll experience a rush of satisfaction when you bake bread from your homegrown wheat.
You'll experience a rush of satisfaction when you bake bread from your homegrown wheat.
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The GrainMaker Model No. 99 mill can be used with the Homestead Huller Kit to remove the hulls of the ancient wheat varieties you grow, including einkorn, emmer and spelt.
The GrainMaker Model No. 99 mill can be used with the Homestead Huller Kit to remove the hulls of the ancient wheat varieties you grow, including einkorn, emmer and spelt.

Pretty much anywhere in North America, growing wheat is easy if you have a modest-sized plot of unshaded ground, the right seed, and the help of a few small implements.

Depending on your weather conditions and your growing practices, a small plot of wheat — say 500 square feet — should yield 15 to 50 pounds of grain. Yes, that’s a pretty wide range, but soils, rainfall, temperatures, storms, diseases, pests and plain luck can vary from place to place and year to year. Those forces dramatically influence wheat’s yield and quality. But your yield starts with your choice of which varieties of wheat to sow.

Choose a Variety

After you’ve decided to grow wheat, you’ll need to make three initial choices: winter or spring type, red-grained or white-grained, and free-threshing or hulled (with the hull intact). For details on various types of wheat, including durum, spelt, emmer and einkorn, read Types of Wheat: What to Grow and How to Use It.

Winter wheats are sown in fall and harvested the following spring or summer. Spring wheats, which can be either common or durum wheats, are bred for Canadian and northerly U.S. regions where wheat can’t survive through winter; they are sown in early spring and harvested in summer. The seasonal labels are important: A winter variety that does not experience cold weather will produce no grain, while a spring variety sown in fall will die in winter freezes (unless you’re in a frost-free region, where spring wheat varieties can be fall-sown).

The choice between red or white wheat is less consequential, unless you’re growing wheat in an area with high summer rainfall. Under those conditions, white wheat kernels are more susceptible to premature sprouting in the head than red ones. Even a slight start on sprouting can ruin the bread-making quality of wheat grain.

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