Wheat Field June of 1952

This is a picture of my dad in June of 1952 when he was home on furlough from the Korean war.

Look how tall the wheat was. Wow!!

WOW I have not had wheat that tall. I wonder if it stood long enough to harvest???

Neat old picture.

Are you sure it is wheat and not rye?

You are lucky to have a neat photo like that of your Dad!

As to the wheat, when I was growing up in the 60's in northern ND, my Dad and Uncles would tell be about how tall the Durum wheat was in the 40's and 50's and what a time they had dealing with it with the older, small equipment.

The newer durums were bred to put more kernels in the head and waste less energy making straw.

There was a sheaf of it in the farmhouse (I wish I could remember what they said the variety was) 'till a few years ago the mice got it and stripped the heads clean.

I later found a mouse stash of kernels in a nearby cabinet drawer I assumed were from that sheaf, and was always going to plant some kernels and see if any would grow. I never did... I'll have to look and see if the mice ever finished them off!

1957 or 58 dad had winter wheat like that--central Minn. still cut with a binder-shocked and threshed with a mccormick treshing machine. At the time I was 5 foot 10 in. tall and when I threw the cap on the shock it was over my head. Had a 22-36 mccormick on the belt and that old girl barked right along through it all. As I recall, yield was a tad over 60 bu per acre.

I grew some heirloom wheats at Clemson for a historical farm back in the 90's. Got them from places all over the country. Most were 5 to 6 feet tall.
Richard in NW SC

Pretty tall for sure. Wonder how it did not fall down (lodge) in heavy rain or wind. I used to grow fall rye back in the seventies and eighties and it grew very tall as well.

That would make a lot of straw!

I think the heavy heads look like wheat...doesn"t rye have longer beards than what"s in the pic?

One durum variety I remember was Langdon, but that may have been earlier than the 60s.

JD,

Did you raise much wheat? I moved to CR from Indiana in January 1961 - lived there 'til 1977 and never saw a field of wheat in Iowa.

Maybe my eyes were just bad.

Stan

Stan: In the mid 1980s I actually grew 40-50 acres of wheat every year. I was selling hay to the horse market and needed the straw to compliment the hay sales. The oat straw, that was more normal around here, would not sell as the horsey people worried about their horses eating it. I also could get wheat planted much easier than oats in the spring. Just a wider planting window in the fall.

I googled the Langdon, North Dakota Agricultural Experiment Station and read a heading on History.

It mentioned early durums as Stewart and Carleton. These were hit by "15b" rust. I remember the rust years.

These two were crossed with a durum from Palestine called Khapli emmer and from that came varieties Langdon, Ramsey, Yuma and Towner. These were grown into the 1960s.

On the back of the picture my dad has written "Wheat field June of 1952".

Reminds me I'll have to dig it out I have a picture of my dad in 1933 when he was 12 years old along with my uncle and Grandfather loading wheat bundles on a wagon hooked to a team of horses.

We went through all of our old pictures a few years ago and identified people on the pics and dated those that we knew. Now when we are gone, the kids will be able to know who is in the pictures.

Interesting picture but facing facts, here is a perfect example of why we need GM crops. The chaff just gets in the way and sucks up nutrients in the process. By reducing the chaff and allowing the nutrients to go to the head, the farmer gains.

What gets me is why the tree huggers don't realize this and be on their way, or is it a mental blockage with them like other issues across the nation? Can't reason with them because they know no reasoning; just what they think it needs to be.

We use very little silage down here as compared to you guys in the higher latitudes. Consequently on a corn plant, the only thing that does us any good is the contents of the ear......corn. So we have GM seed that grows a short stalk and two ears per stalk. Makes sense to me.

Mark

JD - thanks for the reply.

Over in central Indiana in the '50s we usually grew up to 15 acres of wheat. Dad always said that wheat straw was better bedding for the hogs than oats straw was. I think he said it absorbed moisture better.

Why 15 acres? As I remember, there were restrictions on how much you could grow, based on how much you had grown in the late '40s, to receive price supports - our allotment was 4 or 5 acres. You could grow up to 15 acres and sell at the elevator on the open market - no price supports. Dad was not a believer in government subsidies, so we always raised 15 acres..

I sure hope my memory is right - if not maybe someone will chime in.

Stan

Please don't take this the wrong way. I am NOT taking up for the "tree huggers," although it may seem that way.....
As to GMO. There are valid reasons to object. Going back to basic genetics from even high school, it is seen that breeding out undesirable traits also can breed in other undesirable traits. That is why it can take many years or even decades to breed a better corn, wheat, or other crop. Genetic modification bypasses all of the experimentation and greatly speeds up the process. It also has not been subjected to the same kind of testing as any other synthetic food material.
Enter big companies like Monsanto, DuPont, Allied Chemical, and others, and along comes the payoffs and rubber stamp approvals of relatively untested food products by corrupt officials. After all, food is WAY MORE profitable than fuels and consumer goods, is it not?
My main objection of GMO is that there has not been enough testing done to be certain that the products are SAFE and non-toxic, and nutritious in comparison to their non-GMO counterparts.
What if......
GMO foods contained significantly less nutritional value than their non-GMO counterparts?
What if GMO foods contained undiscovered toxicity that was cumulative? And what if that toxicity came out of the same gene that was implanted to increase yield?

I am not saying that it is or is not, but only pointing out that there are TWO sides to the discussion. Both sides have valid arguments.

My personal position is that I would decline to purchase a GMO product if there were a non-GMO counterpart available.
And I am DEFINITELY NOT a tree hugger! I drive an SUV and enjoy living in a warm house burning fossil fuels to keep it warm, etc.

Well sir thank you for your time and opinion. Personally, I will die before any such product would hasten the process, no brag, just fact.

Mark