|
Post by Alan on Jan 30, 2009 13:48:35 GMT -5
Writen by Tim Peters Here are my suggestions for those of you who are growing grain but have no combine or small thresher per se. For a thresher you can use/do the following with good relative efficiency.
METHOD 1 1. several large tarps. (i use the cheap plastic ones). 2. A large box fan. 3. A Leaf rake. 4. A 2x2 up to 3x3 square of hardware cloth (screen) of the right size, mounted on a wood frame, to let the seed thru quickly but keep back most/all the bigger untreshed head/pieces. 5. A good wheelbarrow. 6. Some 5 gal. buckets. 7. A rubber tired vehicle, like a car or truck. 8. A slab of cement, like a driveway or garage floor.
Harvest by hand, using your arm to bunch and one hand to grasp the head bunch (don't gather all that stalk material), and the other hand holding the rose/hand pruner/clipper to massively cut off the heads (below the hand that is grasping them just below the head). Then drop them into your 35 gal plastic garbage can which you are dragging long, ...and repeat.
Dump heads on a tarp that is placed on the slab of cement (or very smooth ground). Perhaps put another tarp over the top. Drive your vehicle wheel over the pile, back and forth across the pile. Pull off tarp. Rake off onto top tarp the untreshed heads. Lift tarp sides to pile remaining, pour into bucket, set box fan on wheelbarrow handles, turn on high, stand on side and pour grain threshings into barrow in front of fan (on the barrow angled front side to create a deflected non damaging fall for seed), repeat, use a dustpan and dust broom to get back into bucket. put sceen over barrow, pour on as much seed as is sane, move the screen side to side vigourously across the top of barrow, throw residue back onto tarp for further thresh... repeat until satisfied with seed cleaning. Use a cookie sheet and tweezers to remove anything else from the batch, later.
METHOD 2 There are some old fashioned leaf shredders that can be made to run at low speeds and blades can be rubbered, i have one... exceeding useful and very quickly cleaned between varieties... I will get you all pictures I hope in the next couple of months, if I can get back across the country to where they are. ....this is used on the tarp with cloth drappery at base to keep it from spitting the seeds across the countryside... rest of procedure is as above... very quick once you get the hang of it. TAKE GREAT CARE TO KEEP SEEDS OF ONE VARIETY FROM HAVING ANOTHER VARIETY FLY INTO THEM... THIS IS EASIER BY FAR THAN TRYING TO CLEAN UP A VARIETY LATER, BELIEVE ME.
HAND THRESH METHOD you can use a rough block of wood and a rubber mat to rub loose the seed of single head selections.
...hope these methods I developed help you Tim Peters, seed and research
|
|
|
Post by macmex on Jan 30, 2009 20:56:12 GMT -5
Thanks Alan! I've been hoping to find this kind of information since last summer when I harvested wheat. It's still in one of my out buildings!
George
|
|
|
Post by raymondo on Jan 30, 2009 23:07:40 GMT -5
Any ideas if this would work for amaranth?
|
|
|
Post by atimberline on Jan 31, 2009 18:48:42 GMT -5
Any ideas if this would work for amaranth? ...it works great for amaranth ... the basic prcedures can be used very effectively for just about any driy harvest seed crop... some like artichokes are particularly tough, and do best thru the leaf shredder or using a sledge hammer. Tim Peters
|
|
|
Post by raymondo on Feb 1, 2009 6:01:53 GMT -5
Thanks Tim. I'll give it a try next season for Amaranth and Weeping Ricegrass (Microlaena stipoides, an Australian perennial grass with rice-like seeds).
|
|
|
Post by bunkie on Feb 18, 2009 10:27:56 GMT -5
ray, is that 'weeping grass' grown on land or in water? and is it tasty...like rice?
|
|
|
Post by raymondo on Feb 24, 2009 23:11:50 GMT -5
Bunkie, it grows in paddocks and fields. The only water it gets is what falls from above. It's reasonably drought tolerant once established. Its flavour is slightly nuttier than rice, I would say. I use it mixed with rice though it takes less time to cook. The grain is smaller than rice, slimmer really. I don't grow it for harvest myself. In fact, no-one in Australia does, apart from one farmer who is helping a researcher. I buy the grain from him indirectly but it's currently too expensive to be of general appeal. I bought it to try growing it myself.
|
|
|
Post by Owen on Oct 19, 2009 21:41:54 GMT -5
I finally figured out a method of threshing amaranth this year. I rubbed the heads between my hands into a large bucket (a wheel barrow would work too), I then sifted the mess of seeds and chaff/flower pieces through ordinary bugscreen attached to a wooden frame. If you can just get the right screens it's easy as could be. Whatever chaff that gets through along with the seeds can be easily winnowed out. It worked for me, for the first time ever I produced tons of clean amaranth seed.
|
|
|
Post by atash on May 16, 2010 19:11:53 GMT -5
Thanks for the post. I'll download it, print it, and add it to a database of useful information. I'm equipment-poor myself.
|
|
|
Post by steev on Nov 16, 2010 19:32:47 GMT -5
Weeping ricegrass? A perennial grain? Sounds like my kind of crop!
|
|
|
Post by raymondo on Nov 17, 2010 2:31:36 GMT -5
steev, yes, it is an interesting grain. I haven't yet found a source of seeds within my price range. I may have to harvest some from the wild this coming summer.
|
|
|
Post by steev on Nov 19, 2010 17:52:34 GMT -5
I found a picture of weeping ricegrass; it didn't look very productive. Does it need a sizable planting to amount to anything, or does it produce lightly but continually for a long season?
|
|
|
Post by raymondo on Nov 20, 2010 15:38:06 GMT -5
I don't know much about it. I guess like most wild plants, it would need work to improve productivity. It was used as a source of grain by the indigenous peoples but it never captured the imagination of the European settlers. Only one university is looking at it as far as I know and they're looking at it from a molecular point of view. In other words, they are looking at tinkering directly with the genome to improve it rather than traditional breeding work. There are several native grasses that have potential as (perennial) grains. If I were a young man and had the space, I'd work on them.
|
|
|
Post by steev on Nov 20, 2010 19:38:25 GMT -5
I'm not a young man, but I have the space and sating my curiosity is as good a reason as I know for doing anything. It just occurred to me to wonder about the potential for introducing another pest-plant to California. Do you know any down-side to this grass? Is it fodder for grazing? It looked like a bunch-grass.
|
|
|
Post by steev on Nov 20, 2010 19:41:31 GMT -5
Returning to the start of this thread, that idea of driving on the wheat has been used to de-hull black walnuts, too.
|
|