Wheat Variety

Choose Variety

There are two basic types of wheat: winter and spring. Winter wheat is seeded in the fall, grows slowly during the winter months, accelerates in growth as spring arrives, and is ready for harvest in early summer. Where winters are harsh, spring wheat is planted in the spring and harvested in late summer. It can also be sown in the fall where winters are very mild.

There are winter and spring varieties of both hard and soft wheat. Hard wheats are rich in gluten and make fine bread flour. Soft wheats are generally grown in areas with high levels of rainfall. They tend to be rich in starch and low in gluten. Soft wheats lack stickiness for bread making but are used in pastries and are often mixed with bread wheats. White wheat is usually soft winter wheat.

Some Popular Varities are: DBW 17, HD 2851, HD 2932, PBW 1 Zn, Unnat PBW 343, PDW 233, WHD 943, TL 2908, etc

CLASSIFICATION:

More than 30 subspecies of wheat (Triticum) are known. Some are cultivated, and some still grow wild. A wheat species is classified according to the number and makeup of chromosomes and the structure of the head (spike or ear) of the plant. Chromosomes are the carriers of genetic information in the plant cell. The primitive and early cultivated wheats, such as einkorn (T. monococcum), had only 14 chromosomes. They are called diploids. Later types, such as durum (T. durum), emmer (T. dicoccon), and Polish wheats (T. polonicum), have 28 chromosomes and are called tetraploid wheat. The hexaploid wheats—spelt (T. spelta), club (T. compactum), and most of the common bread wheats (T. aestivum)—have 42 chromosomes. Most commercial wheats are either common wheat, used to make bread and flour; durum wheat, a hard wheat used for stock feed and to make pasta such as spaghetti and macaroni; or club wheat, a softer type, low in protein, used for pastry flour.