Wheat Seeds (Triticum spp.)

Grains are a surprisingly easy and very rewarding crop for home gardeners. They can be planted as early as the ground can be worked in spring. Here in coastal British Columbia (zones 7-9), October or November sowings also produce excellent results. Late fall or early spring plantings are harvested before August, opening possibilities for mid-summer sowings of other crops.

Grains tend to "lodge" or fall over in very fertile earth, so you can plant them in your less enriched areas. To first-time growers I recommend sowing grains an inch or so apart in rows. After a season of multiplying them, planting in blocks works well. Lightly cover the seed with soil and put out a scarecrow if birds are raiding.

Harvest ripe seed when the plants have dried down completely. Pick or cut individual heads and thresh by hand or foot rubbing. I use a simple wooden threshing box that is 3 feet by 4 feet by 1 foot high with some thin slats screwed onto the inside bottom for extra abrasion. A foot shuffle over the hard grains removes the chaff from the kernels. I then use a nozzle attachment on my air compressor to quickly clean the seed. Fanning, screening and winnowing work too.

Few people realize that wheat can be sprouted or cooked as the whole wheat "berries" they are. In fact, these delicious ways of eating wheat provide much more nutritional benefit than consuming it as bread or pasta.

Your homegrown wheat will cook up in about an hour at a low simmer.

Try soaking kamut (or other wheat) kernels overnight, draining and then rinsing them twice daily for two or three days. At this stage of early sprouting, they seem to be just bursting with goodness and are wonderful with salads or soups.

Saving your own seed: Grain cultivars don't cross, so saving seed for planting is simply a matter of not eating all the harvest.

Packets of all the grains listed below contain one tablespoon or 300+ seeds.