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Cereal farming
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What is cereal farming?
Cereal farming involves growing cereal crops like wheat, rice, and corn (maize) for food, livestock feed, industrial starch, and biofuel. Cereal farming varies by country, depending on economic development, soil, rainfall, and farming techniques. Modern cereal trade relies on silos for storage at export points and docks. Inefficient storage can lead to significant losses from insects and rodents.
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Which crops are considered cereals?
Cereals are grasses cultivated for their starchy seeds, serving as food for humans and livestock, as well as for industrial uses like starch and biofuel.
The most common cereals are wheat, rice, corn (maize), rye, oats, barley, sorghum, and some millets. These grains are rich in carbohydrates but lack calcium and vitamin A.
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What conditions do cereal crops need to grow well?
Cereal crops like wheat, rye, and barley need specific conditions to grow well, including fertile soil and sufficient rainfall. A minimum annual rainfall of 254 mm is generally needed, and the soil should be fertile, with good humus content and chemical fertilizers. Cool-season cereals require temperatures with a minimum between 0° to 5° C, with the optimum range between 25° to 31° C. Also, purity of the seed is important, and seeds are frequently cleaned and treated with fungicides to prevent disease transmission.
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How are cereal crops typically planted and harvested?
Cereal crops, including wheat, rice, corn (maize), rye, oats, barley, sorghum, and some millets, are planted using various types of plowing machinery and other implements to prepare the soil. The equipment depends on factors such as climate, ground, and rainfall. Seeds are sown by hand, broadcast, or dropped and then covered with a harrow.
In developed countries, harvesting is mainly done using a combine harvester, which cuts the standing grain, threshes the grain from the straw and chaff, cleans the grain, and discharges it into bags or grain reservoirs. In developing countries, however, the ancient scythe, sickle, and flail are still widely used.
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What are common challenges cereal farmers face?
Cereal farmers face various challenges that affect their crop yields and economic stability.
Challenges
- Pests and Diseases Insects like grasshoppers and aphids can cause significant damage, and fungal diseases such as black rust and smut can destroy crops.
- Weeds Weeds compete with cereal crops for vital resources such as water, light, and nutrients, reducing overall yields.
- Price Instability Farm prices tend to fluctuate more than other prices, causing income instability for farmers. This is due to the slow response to demand changes and reliance on expectations.
- Soil Fertility Maintaining soil fertility is crucial. Farmers need to manage nutrient levels to ensure healthy plant growth.
- Weather Winter crops are often disturbed by frost, and heavy rains can crust the soil, affecting root consolidation and aeration.
- Control measures Farmers use various control measures such as chemical pesticides, herbicides, and crop rotation.
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How does cereal farming impact the environment and society?
Cereal farming, which involves growing cereal crops like wheat, rice, and corn, can impact the environment through water pollution from agrochemical runoff and soil erosion. Sustainable practices such as crop rotation and reduced tillage can help mitigate these effects. Additionally, the judicious use of fertilizers and pesticides can minimize air pollution. Intensive cultivation and poor land management may lead to the erosion of topsoil, which can end up in waterways in the form of sediment.
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Cereal farming, growing of cereal crops for human food and livestock feed as well as for other uses, including industrial starch and biofuel. Cereals, or grains, are members of the grass family (Poaceae) cultivated primarily for their starchy dry fruits. Wheat, rice, corn (maize), rye, oats, barley, sorghum, and some of the millets are common cereals.
The cultivation of cereals varies widely in different countries and depends partly upon the degree of economic development. Other factors include the nature of the soil, the amount of rainfall, and the techniques applied to promote growth. In illustrating production problems, this article uses wheat as the example. For information on the cultivation of other cereal crops, see articles on the individual crops. For information on the food value and processing of cereals, see cereal processing.
Cultivation of wheat
Wheat can be cultivated over a wide range of soils and can be successfully grown over large portions of the world, ranging in altitude from sea level to over 3,050 metres (10,000 feet). Annual rainfall of 254 mm (10 inches) is generally considered the minimum, and the soil should be sufficiently fertile. Barley and rye can be grown in soil less fertile than that required for wheat. Soils with a good humus content (partially decayed organic matter) and chemical fertilizers generally are necessary.
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Purity of the seed is important. The seed wheat (or other cereal seeds) must be true to its particular variety and as free as possible from foreign seeds. Seeds are frequently cleaned to avoid contamination by other seed crops and weeds. They often also are treated with fungicides to prevent disease transmission. Modern cleaning methods employ such devices as oscillating sieves or revolving cylinders. Seed obtained with a combine harvester is often unsuited for use as seed wheat without preliminary treatment.
Spring and winter varieties exist for both wheat and barley. Winter varieties generally produce better crops but have more-stringent climate requirements. Winter wheat should form a good root system and should begin to form new shoots before the cold weather sets in; winter wheat is likely to have more tillers (side or axillary shoots) than spring wheat. The rate of sowing varies from 22.5 kg per hectare (20 pounds per acre) upward. Depth of sowing, usually 2.5 to 7.5 cm (1 to 3 inches), can be less in certain areas.
Breeding
Wheat and other cereals are self-fertilized. The pollen carried by the stamen of a given flower impregnates the pistil (stigma and ovary) of the same flower, enabling the variety to breed true. Wheat flowers are grouped in spikelets, each bearing from two to nine flowers, or florets. To produce new varieties by cross-fertilization, the cereal breeder artificially transfers the stamen from one variety to the flower of another before self-fertilization takes place. The production of a sufficient supply of the new type of seeds for sowing is time-consuming and expensive, but it allows new varieties to be evolved, retaining the desirable characteristics from each parent. For example, in the United Kingdom and Australia, varieties of the wheat that yield well often produce flour of poor baking quality; proper selection of parent plants permits new varieties to be produced that yield well and still possess good baking qualities.
Other reasons for developing new varieties include resistance to rust (fungus; see below Fungus diseases) and other diseases, resistance to drought, and development of stronger and shorter straw to make harvesting easier. Nobel laureate Norman Borlaug developed a short-stemmed (“dwarf”) strain of wheat that dramatically increased crop yields; it is estimated that the introduction of his strain to less-developed countries has saved as many as one billion people from starvation and death.
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Seedbed preparation
Various types of plowing machinery and other implements are employed to render the soil more suitable for planting. The equipment used depends upon such factors as the climate, the nature of the ground, and the rainfall. Tillage, the process of preparing soil for cultivation purposes, varies considerably around the world. Mechanized plows are common in commercial cereal farms, while animal-drawn plows or even hand-tillage techniques are often employed on small farms, especially in less-developed countries. Serious soil erosion may require special procedures to maintain clods and plant residues in the soil.
In North America it is normal practice to grow wheat on the same ground for as long as sufficiently clean crops are produced, but eventually the ground must rest fallow for a year. The moisture of the land at the time of sowing is an important factor. The ancient procedure of rotating cereals with legumes to improve the soil is still common in Europe, though less so in North America. Fertilization of the ground is useful to increase the crop yield, but it does not generally increase the protein content of the crop.