748 DISCUSSION ON WHEAT: 
in preference to other cereals; thus as a human food it is displacing rice, 
millet and other grains in the East, and maize on the American Continent. 
The production of wheat, in fact, is now one of the most fundamental of 
the problems of our time and also one of the most complex; it raises many 
issues, and many interests are concerned with it. 
Many varieties of wheat are known, differing more or less in character 
and in requirements. The grower has to discover which variety or varieties 
are suited to the conditions of his locality and to cultivate that which will 
yield him most profit. It may well happen that the most profitable variety 
is not that which he can grow most easily, and he is in a measure obliged to 
effect a compromise. 
In England, in the eastern States of America and other places where 
excess of water has to be avoided, drainage must be resorted to; elsewhere, 
in the western States of America and in India, for example, extensive 
irrigation works have been undertaken; where irrigation has not been 
possible special methods of cultivation are adopted, in order to secure the 
necessary supply of water—-as among the natives of India and of Syria, 
and in the case of the system of so-called dry farming now in vogue on the 
western prairies of America. The old systems of husbandry were all 
arranged with the object of securing the maximum possible supply of food 
for the wheat plant. 
Among the difficulties to be faced by the modern grower of wheat those 
due to drought, frost, and rust are the most serious. 
Wheat is for a number of reasons an admirable crop for the pioneer. 
It is always saleable; it can be stored and sent long distances without 
deteriorating ; of all agricultural commodities it is.the easiest to transport. 
It is easily grown, requiring but little capital, and it does well on newly 
broken grounds; a few years of wheat cultivation affords an admirable 
opportunity of getting virgin land into condition for any other scheme of 
husbandry that may be desirable. As long as the present wave of expan- 
sion continues in Canada, Argentina, Australia, Russia, and elsewhere, 
enormous supplies of wheat will be produced under pioneer conditions, not 
necessarily as a permanent business but to some extent, at any rate, as a 
temporary expedient. During the last twenty or thirty years the supplies 
have been so cheap as to displace wheat from its premier position in the 
rotation system of long-settled countries and to convert it into a by-product. 
The change came quickly and caused terrible loss and suffering to farmers 
who failed to take notice of its occurrence dnd to alter their scheme of 
husbandry. But the change is not ended; the price of wheat is now going 
up—-whether because of any slackening in the wave of expansion or, as some 
economists assert, because of the extraordinary output of gold in recent 
years, we need not discuss—and once more the proper place to be assigned 
to wheat in the scheme of husbandry becomes an open question. 
The scientific problems are no less complex. Much must be done before 
the conditions necessary for the growth of wheat are fully elucidated. 
Although the requirements of the wheat crop are fairly well known, it is 
impossible at present to explain why a brick earth in Kent or Sussex will 
produce 45 to 55 bushels of grain without difficulty, whilst the stiff loam 
at Rothamsted only yields 35 to 45 bushels, no matter how well it be 
manured. The size of the crop is limited, among other factors, by the 
stiffness of the straw. If instead of standing up well the plants become 
‘laid,’ it is costly to harvest; hence the farmer does not aim at the 
maximum crop but at the biggest crop that will stand. Stiffness of straw 
is influenced by a soil condition not yet clearly made out; crops will stand 
on one soil, while others of the same kind will be ‘laid’ on soil of a 
different type. 
The different varieties of wheat are not all of the same market value. 
