Growing grains takes special equipment that we do not have. Our grain crops are planted and harvested for us by our neighbors Mark and Matt Cooley. They have all the big equipment needed. If we are to grow many different crops for our grain csa then it becomes difficult for Mark and Matt to do with their large equipment.
A few weeks ago we sowed wheat with our vegetable/salad seeding machine as an experiment. We are treating the crops just like any other we grow. It was cultivated with our brush hoe last Friday. We planted 4 beds so that the combine can harvest the crop. If we want to grow just a small amount (1/2 acre) of Emmer then using the large combine makes no sense. I am looking to acquire a small combine. These are made for harvesting small trial crops on university farms. There were also harvesters that could be pulled by a tractor made in the 50's and 60's. They worked well just no as fast as the big combines of today. Gary Erwin, our landlord on the back forty is helping me locate a combine. We have some time as none of the crops sown this fall will be harvested until June. Once we have a combine then we can expand the number of crops we grow for the grain csa each year.
The picture blow is of Mark and Matt's combine.