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Description: There are seven commercial classes of wheat under the official grain standards of the United States: Hard Red Spring, Durum, Red Durum, Hard Red Winter, Soft Red Winter, White, and mixed. Wheat is one of the top three most heavily produced crops in the world, along with corn and rice. It is an annual crop that is often seeded on corn stubble or grown in rotation with forages such as clover or timothy, or after cultivated crops such as corn or oats. Wheat grown in the United States falls into two categories: winter wheat, which is planted in the fall and matures in the summer, or spring wheat, which is planted after the danger of frost has passed. It also matures in the summer. For seedbed preparation the field needs to be plowed, then tilled using a disk to break down the soil into fine particles, before being harrowed to further smooth out the seed bed before drilling (seeding). The first image is of wheat seeds, which are about 3 to 10 mm long. It is sown at an average seeding rate of 120 lbs per acre, at a depth of 1½ - 4 inches, in rows that are 6-8 inches apart. The different types of wheat grow to between 24-48 inches tall. Images two and three are of a wheat field and the wheat heads (spikes) in an early stage prior to harvesting. The average spike contains 25 to 30 grains in 14 to 17 spikelets. The last image is of a wheat field ready to harvest, which is when the heads of the grain start to bend the stalks with the weight of the kernels, in combination with the color change from green to a golden yellow. This occurs in May to September, depending on the part of the country in which the crop is being grown. Wheat is harvested with a combine that first removes the spikes from the stalks and then threshes the kernels from the spikelets. Wheat is most widely known for producing flour and other human food products but it can also be fed to farm animals either as the grain, or as a by-product of the milling industry such as: wheat bran, millrun, middlings (midds), shorts, or red dog. These feedstuffs consist of varying amounts of bran, germ, and flour, are very palatable to animals, and can be included at high levels in concentrate mixtures.

Resolution: 1440x1080

File Size: 1.23 MB