WHEAT HARVEST METHODS

Press, Volume LXXV, Issue 22636, 15 February 1939, Page 12

WHEAT HARVEST METHODS

Use of Header Questioned

INSTITUTE’S “COMPLETE

ANSWER”

'‘Headed wheat that is thoroughly in condition is as good as that harvested by other means —but it must be in condition or it will suffer in quality,” said Dr. F. W. Hilgendorf, director or the Wheat Research Institute, in an interview with “The Press” yesterday, when be gave an answer to a correspondent. Following correspondence in The Press ” “Ploughman Junior” on £ ebruary 9 asked “Grown-up Ploughman to explain how to make headed wheat or stock-threshed wheat equal m value to that which is stacked and sweated. “Grown-Up Ploughman” did not reply. Dr. Hilgendorf said there was a complete answer ready in the reports of the Wheat Research Institute. For two successive years, comparisons were made of stook threshed an stack threshed wneat from the same flpld Several varieties were usea each year, said the director. Stocks were lifted from various parts of Hie field and threshed as soon as s^f i^+ ’ while the rest of the stooks were built into a large stack and threshed after eight weeks. The flo £f ® xtr fhe lW "took ♦he baking score from the stooit threshed and the stack threshed were identic year, a comparison of threshed and headed wheat was made. Twllve "different fields were taken and in each one a part was stook-threshed and part headed. Wheat from each, treatment was then milled and"baked. There was no appreciable difference in the’bushel weight, gluten quantity, yield of flour, or baking SC “These figures show that the method of harvesting in itself does not influence the quality of the wheat, said Dr Hilgendorf. But on the other hand it is perfectly true that headed wheat is often inferior to wheat threshed from the stock or stack. The reason is that growers have long experience of threshing stocked* wheat, and almost never put it into bags till it is ready. But they have not the same experience of heading wheat, and in some cases they head it before i - is ready* and thus spoil a perfectly S °l°t d was to meet this difficulty that the institute installed at Christchurch and Ashburton a free moisture testing service for wheatgrowers. If a grower sent in a sample of wheat, he would be told within an hour of its. receipt whether the field from which the sample was drawn was ready to head, or how long it would probably have to wait. The less heading experience the grower had the more careful he should be to take this precaution. “So the answer to the question asked is shortly this. When you are about to use the header, send your wheat to be tested for moisture and do not head it until it is down to 15.5 per cent. Headed crops are exposed to weather risks, which everyone must measure for himself. But where headers are to be used, it is important that they should be used in such a way as to give wheat of the best quality.”