Here’s the news regarding N.C. efforts to grow and market hard wheat, from Jennifer Lapidus:
I am the Project Coordinator of the NCOBFP. I am actually located in Asheville, but CFSA is the grant administrator. For a little background info, check out the beginnings of a blog I recently set up: http://ncobfp.blogspot.com/
In regards to the question of whether one can wheat grow in NC, the answer is yes. Soft wheat, which is wheat with lower protein, used for pastries and such, has been grown in NC for quite a while.
Hard wheat, aka bread wheat, has not traditionally been a successful grain in the Southeast due to our humidity, which causes disease in the field and poor performance quality in the bakery.
But beginning in 2002, the USDA-Agricultural Research Service began a program to identify and breed wheat having hard (bread wheat) quality for eventual production in the humid environments of the eastern U.S.
For the identification phase of this program, varieties and advanced breeding lines were obtained from breeders in the Great Plains (principally Texas, Oklahoma, Kansas, Nebraska, Colorado) and tested in Georgia, North Carolina, Kentucky, Virginia, Maryland, and Pennsylvania. Results from these trials, named the Uniform Bread Wheat Trials, are posted on the website http://www.ars.usda.gov/saa/psru. Several hard wheats were identified that had the yield, disease resistance, and grain quality needed for production in locations on the eastern U.S.
Also, here in WNC, Anne Gaines, of Gaining Ground Farm planted 18 varieties of landrace, heritage, and modern wheat in test plots for this NCOBF project.
Historically, wheat has actually been grown in the Eastern US as far back as the 1600s. Wheat was actually introduced to the Eastern United States about 200 years before the Great Plains. The introduction of wheat in the Eastern United States took place in the 1600s via Western European settlers; in the late 1700s the settlers of California brought with them varieties of wheat from Spain; and finally, in the 1870s, the introduction of wheat into the Great Plains came via settlers from Eastern Europe and the Ukraine. For each region, the climate and wheat type were reasonably well matched. These wheats predated distinctions between “hard” and “soft”. These were landracewheats, roughly defined as varieties that adapted to their environment . Today, these old varieties of wheat are being rediscovered. Nationwide, bakers and farmers are talking and the discussion revolves around what will work in the field and work in the bakery.
Traditionally, wheat breeders have bred for high yield and disease resistance, but the baker’s concern is with the quality of the wheat—its flavor and performance. As the price of wheat and fuel have continued to climb, the concept of local wheat production has really taken off.
The New York Times ran a great article about this move toward local wheat production back in September: http://www.nytimes.com/2008/09/10/dining/10wheat.html?_r=2&scp=1&sq=September 10, 2008- flour That Has the Flavor of Home&st=cse [or via tiny URL http://bit.ly/mqoA ]
In terms of seedsmanship—with the humidity we experience in the South, and the rains during harvest time—this project will be served by looking at both modern and old varieties of wheat.
My job is to:
• organize the bakers so they can work directly with farmers growing wheat in North Carolina
• help forge relationships and
• educate the bakers community as to how to work with regional wheats—which will probably vary compared with the uniform flour they are used to from the Midwest
We (CFSA and a sister grant to NCSU, USDA, NCDA) have two years of funding for research and development in order to do lay the groundwork for a viable local “wheat farm to fork economy” in North Carolina.
