CORN, WHEAT, OATS, BARLEY, RYE 75 



This order varies to some extent with the season. The five states 

 above mentioned jDrodnce about sixty per cent of the barley in 

 the United States. Very little barley is groAvn in the corn belt 

 as it conies in direct comjoetition with corn both as a stock food 

 and for the market. 



Origin of barley. — Barley, like wheat, has i;)layed an impor- 

 tant role as a food since the beginning of history. It was grown 

 by the people of Western Asia nearly two thousand years before 

 the Christian Era. Sjiecimens have been found in the very old 

 Egyptian tombs and some of the oldest coins bear figures of 

 barley heads. The plant from which barley originated is not 

 definitely known but it is thought by many investigators that a 

 two-rowed wild form found near the Red Sea is one, if not the 

 only, ancestor of our cultivated barley. 



Range of barley. — Barley probably has the greatest range of 

 all cultivated crops. It is grown at higher altitudes and lati- 

 tudes than wheat and is also grown within eighteen degrees of 

 the equator. Certain varieties Avill mature in 100 days as far 

 north as Alaska, while others in different localities require much 

 longer periods of growth. There are ))oth winter and spring 

 varieties. The winter varieties are less hardy than winter 

 wheat ])ut the spring varieties are mucli more hardy than spring 

 Avheats. 



Classification of barleys. — Due to the wide range of produc- 

 tion of barley many distinct varieties have been developed, and 

 as in other grains, there is much confusion in the naming of 

 varieties. On account of this confusion some kind of a classifi- 

 cation is necessary. The most common classification is based on 

 the number of rows of fertile spikelets and the attitude and 

 width of head as follows : 



(Heads lax and nnddiiif; 

 (Chovalicr, II anna, Ilannchen, etc.) 

 TT 1 J 1 1 J 



Heads erect and broad 

 ( Goldthorpe, Primus, etc.) 



(Heads lax and noddinj^ 

 (Manchuria-Oderl)rucher, Featherslon, Bav Brewing, etc.) 

 Heads erect and broad 

 (Triumph, Utah Winter, etc.) 



Within the four types there are many variations consisting of 

 forms of hulled and hulless; awned and hooded; white, blue, 

 purple and black, etc. It is only the lax types, however, that 

 have become important in the United States. The lax two-rowed 

 types, including Chevalier, Hanna, Hannchen, etc., are mostly 

 grown at the high elevations in North Dakota, South Dakota 



