Growing Grain for the Family?

[beetlebrain]

My wife and I are trying to get info on growing our own wheat, buckwheat, and oats for our own family consumption and storage.
Does anyone out there grow their own?
We are interested in knowing about how much [acres, sq ft] we would need for a family of six who bake alot. Also for storing over winter to maintain.
Any advice would be greatly appreciated.
Oh, we are off grid, no power, so we'll be doing all by hand, just like "The Frontier House".
Thanks, Beetlebrain [img]/forums/images/icons/smile.gif[/img]

[DUMBDOG]

You have asked a lot of interesting questions without a lot of information, if you filled out your information, one would be able to guess of yields, etc. How much baking is a lot? A estimate of annual flour requirements would have been better.

So here go a lot of assumptions and estimates from a lot of web searches.

Average daily flour consumption based on wheat. 1 1/2 cups per person per day. This comes out to 9 cups per day or an annual estimated usage of 3285 cups per year.

A pound and half of wheat is required for 4 cups of flour. 3285/4 * 1.5 equals 1232 pounds of wheat.

You also do not say on how this crop will be planted or harvested. So a low estimation of yield of 18 bushels per acre will be used and a low weight to allow for dockage, 52# per bushel.

So based on these assumptions you would require 1.32 acres of wheat to yield 1 1/2 cups per person per day for a year.

Oats will yield 3 cups per pound and corn 3 1/2 cups of flour per pound.

As far as storage goes, dry and free from vernim. sealable metal containers would work the best.

[egon]

Curious as to how you will harvest, thresh and grind your grain. The threshing may be the hardest part.

Home grinding will retain all of the kernel and bread may be very solid and heavy.

I'd suggest a trial plot to see how it all works out for harvest and threshing and then take it from there.

Egon

[beetlebrain]

Thanks for the technical aspect, DUMBDOG. I thought that maybe someone out there was ALREADY growing for their own family's consumption and could share their real life experience. As mentioned in the post, egon, we are off grid, no power, so everything will be done by hand. Yes, a bit more labor intensive but then again, we aren't growing thousands of acres. Thanks for al the input, Beetlebrain.

[Lazy]

Hi
Are you saying you are not going to use a tractor to till the garden?

Charlie.

[beetlebrain]

Heck yeah, that part is going to be handled by machinery.

[Pat]

Grain stores better than flour. You can spread out the flour grinding task. Metal containers that can be sealed are good for storage of grain or flower. Using a food grade plastic bag as a liner is good. To reduce loss due to weevils, you can place some dry ice in the bottom of the container before filling with grain or flower. Do the math, use enough so that the CO2 produced is more than enough to fill the container with nothing else in it. Lightly seal the plastic bag at the top with a rubber band. As the CO2 sublimates (goes directly from solid to gas) the air (and its O2) wil be displaced by the heavier CO2. Later if weevils etc. do hatch out they sufocate and do not eat your grain nor reproduce. The exclusion of O2 has a preseervative effect.

I'm sure some web searches will turn up step by step directions for various foods. CO2 will help preserve pasta and lots of dried foods by reducing O2 contact and elliminating bugs. It does not harm the food or cause any off flavors. It allows you to buy or make in bulk and store for a long time without bug problems.

Hand ground flour! Whew. Either learn to like really course bread or prepare yourself for a lot of milling. I would consider a home "counter top" mill like the ones that have pretty good sized electric motors. If your generator can't handle it substitute a different power source for the electric motor. Maybe a belt drive from a gas engine (old lawn mower or whatever) How about a PTO driven mill? Hand crank would be way way down my list of choices. It doesn't take too long to mill good fine flour with a decent mill but you need a half horse electric motor to drive a decent mill. Maybe a goat or tow in harness?

[img]/forums/images/icons/smile.gif[/img] Pat [img]/forums/images/icons/smile.gif[/img]