What's wrong with my wheat?

Hi guys,


As some of you know, I am trying for the second year to grow wheat.

It doesn't look good.

I have searched the symptoms over the internet, but couldn't figure out what the problem is.

I am attaching some pictures but they are not that good quality.

Here are the symptoms I am observing:

1. The wheat is not standing straight. A few plants are vertical, but most are just leaning in every possible direction, bending, arching, etc. Not only after rain, all the time. I noticed that pretty early on, maybe as early as March. It's wheat sowed end of November by the way.

2. The wheat is very heterogenous. Some plants are taller than me. Some are just 30 cm (12 inches) high. Some are straight, most are bent

3. Compared to wheat fields around me, it doesn't seem dense at all. It doesn't look like it tillered at all. Not sure what the right word is in English, in French it's "tallage", meaning growing more stems from the same plant.

4. Until it started drying, I noticed it looked very blue. I searched the internet and did find pictures of blue wheat fields, so I thought it was ok, but still it's weird

5. When it started drying, it didn't turn yellow but white. Now it seems it's getting a bit more yellow, but still pretty pale

The heads do seem pretty well filled and developed, so I am thinking that each head will probably give a reasonable amount of grain, but I will probably have less productive plants than I should have, and I don't expect a good yield.

Does anybody have any idea what could be wrong?

In terms of fertilisation, this plot is in the middle of the forest, hasn't been used for years and I spread some horse manure before sowing. I am thinking it's probably well fed, and am even wondering whether the problem could be overfertilisation.

Another hypothesis I have is a lack of sunlight. It is in the middle of the forest. It did receive sunlight during winter because sun was passing below the tree leaves, but less in late spring. It's definitely not as bright as an open field.

I am also thinking it could be just my sowing technique that was bad. That would explain a low density, and maybe weak stems, but not the absence of tillering.

I am attaching some pictures. They were taken on May 21st, thus already a while from now.

Thanks a lot in advance for the help!

Well done in getting a yield. I'm trying barley and oats and learning fast!
I gather that plants are supposed to tiller more if they are further apart. I seem to remember that a way of increasing tillering is to harrow the field after germination...but that may be me making stuff up!
Purple leaves - possibly phosphorus deficiency? What's your soil pH like?

Looks good from my experience. Consider the seed,  I was growing for chicken feed and planted feed wheat which is a mix of what is left in the bottom of the bins so cam out with a variety of charactaristics,

I suspect your idea about the low sunlight is correct.

As for leaning over, it may be the low seeding density. The plants support their neighbors, so if they are too far apart the wind easily pushes them over. Low light will also result in weak roots and stems.

Looks great to me.

I observe a few different varieties of wheat, and some oats. Growing in shade will tend to make plants skinnier, and thus more likely to fall over (lodging). Growing within the protection of trees, will lessen a plants ability to develop strength to withstand winds, so when a wind or strong rain does come along, they may fall over more easily. Fertilizer tends to make plants more leggy, also increasing the chances of falling over.

Thanks a lot for the swift, helpful and supportive replies guys!

Some more elements on the situation, that seem relevant to me given your answers:

- Not only the leaves were blue, also the stems. Does it change your idea about phosphorus deficiency?
- No idea what the soil pH is. It's in the middle of the forest though, and no pine in the direct vicinity, so I would tend to think pretty neutral, but I haven't made any measurement
- The seeds are those that I harvested last year, and the year before I bought them to a local farmer, who grows on a larger scale. So theoretically last year's seeds were good. This year's I don't know, they're the ones I harvested.
- I sowed only two varieties. One of soft wheat and one of hard wheat. I sowed them in different subplots, though both are seen in the pictures. The other varieties you see are unfortunately wild stuff.

Some questions:
1. I see that two of you are both saying that it looks good, while still acknowledging that the stems are long and bent. Does that mean that this is not a problem?
2. I'm glad you find that it looks good. What makes you think so?
3. I had never heard of harrowing after germination. How does that not risk destroying the seedlings?

Thanks again very much for your help!

I don't grow small grains except a few handfuls of oats and rye for fun, but have seen oats and wheat with a deep green-bluish color. Wish I had a clear answer for you. Google suggests nothing on the topic.

I think the dark, blueish color I have seen is from high fertility soil, but I am speculating.

I attribute the bluish color of the plants to the genetics of the plant, not to the environment.

Wheat self-pollinates about 95% of the time, therefore, I don't have any reason to believe that the seed went bad.

By "looks good" I mean that I could go into the field, and harvest the wheat. Even if the plants lean, the seed heads don't seem to lay directly on the ground, so I could harvest them, even though stooping more than I might like. Though, the sorta tipped-over nature of the patch may make them more susceptible to predation by birds.

Annual weeds succumb to harrowing much more easily than grasses do. Therefore, harrowing kills some of the grain, but it really kills the annual weeds.

Vic Dupont wrote:...3. I had never heard of harrowing after germination. How does that not risk destroying the seedlings?

I was thinking I must have made it up because I couldn't find anything much on the internet- then Joseph says it is a thing. However I had my 'Complete book of Self Sufficiency' by John Seymour out (looking up elderflower 'champagne', although I think now I will just make a cordial) and this may be one of the places I read it: about growing wheat (P58 in my book)

You can harrow wheat quite hard when it has started to come up but is not more than six inches (15cm) tall. After you have harrowed it it will look as if you have ruined it, but you haven't. You will have killed several weeds but not the wheat, and the harrowing does good by opening up the surface of the ground.

Nothing there about tillering, which I still swear I read somewhere.....

Thanks a lot for the replies guys!

I harvested it. I haven't winnowed it yet, so I can't tell the exact output, but at first sight it looks like a decent yield, I am very optimistic.

So it seems you were right.

I did not observe much predation by birds or anything, which is kind of surprising in the middle of the forest.

What was a problem though, was for threshing. I had a very hard time because of the flexibility of the stems. I'll start a new discussion on that topic, because it's my second year and I still haven't found a good way to thresh.

Thanks again very much for your help!

Vic Dupont wrote:I did not observe much predation by birds or anything, which is kind of surprising in the middle of the forest.

If I add wheat to my bird feeder, along with other grains, the wheat gets eaten last. I view wheat as famine food: not good for humans or animals, but we will eat it if we get hungry enough.

I have used all sorts of tools, gadgets, and inventions for threshing. After all that, I prefer the traditional methods: Dancing on the seed heads. Beating them with a stick.

Same for winnowing. I have used all the latest equipment, and prefer pouring the grain between buckets on a windy day.

Threshing depends on how much volume you have. If it's not that much, stuff the wheat heads into a large bag and beat it with a stick. Then shake the bag and the wheat will fall to the bottom, the chaff to the top.

Thanks a lot guys!

I'll start a new thread about threshing, because I have constraints to specify, and also to explain the difficulties I've had until now.

As for the initial points of this discussion, I'd like to share my impression and my remaining question.

1) Apparently solved: bending stems

By now it seems pretty clear that the yield is ok, and the bending was not a problem in itself.

Two other elements make me pretty convinced that it was not due to sunlight but to overfertilization.

The first element is that sunlight was unequal on the field. Some parts got more sunlight during winter, some parts more during the spring and early summer, and some were in between, but I don't see any difference across the field. I am thinking that if sunlight was the issue, I would have seen a difference, at least at the end of spring.

The second element is that I read that one should not amend the soil with compost more than half a kilogram per square meter, because otherwise the soil is too light and the roots cannot grab hold, which makes the plants bend over. I didn't add compost but sheep manure, but still, I think I added way more than half a kilo per square meter. I think I emptied a wheel barrel every 4 square meters.

So I am under the impression that this is the explanation for bending plants.

2. Remaining question: heterogeneity

I thus feel confident that I understand why plants were bending, but I still have no idea why the field was so heterogenous. Some plants were a lot taller than others, some dried way earlier than others, etc.

Do you have any idea what could have caused this?

Thanks a lot again very much for the help!

Mixed varieties of seeds, most likely

Thanks for the swift reply!

Theoretically that shouldn't be the case, I bought the seeds a year before to a local farmer, when he sold them to me I'm pretty sure they were well isolated. When I harvested last year, I also was pretty careful to keep them separated.