Chemical Notes on Wheat and Flour. 335 



Flour made in this city, branded " strong bakers ", gave 

 moist gluten 32.00 p.c, dry 12.41 p.c, whilst a sample,- 

 which would not rank as bakers' from same milling gave 

 only 28 c 78 p.c. moist gluten, and 9. 27 p.c. dry. 



The connection between "hard" wheat and "strong" 

 flour is thus clear, but the question will arise, why should 

 some wheats be soft and others hard ? This question I am 

 unable to answer, but I wish to present certain facts con- 

 nected, I think, with the solution of the problem, in the 

 hope that some of our members, reasoning from these facts, 

 may throw light upon the subject. It is true there are cer- 

 tain wheats which, however they may have become so, are 

 now soft varieties and tend to reproduce a soft wheat, 

 whilst other varieties known as hard tend to reproduce 

 hard. But we also find that a wheat which in one part of 

 the country will reproduce a hard grain, will in another 

 locality yield a soft. And still further, a locality which in 

 one season yields hard wheat, will, in a succeeding one, 

 from similar seed, produce a soft grain. 



The officers of the Bureau of Chemistry in the U.S. Dept. 

 of Agriculture, have made an exhaustive examination of 

 wheats collected from all parts of the Union, from which it 

 appears that as we proceed from the eastern seaboard west- 

 ward, the wheat is harder and harder until the States on 

 the Pacific slope are reached, where the wheat of the coun- 

 try is again soft. In our own country, every miller knows 

 that Ontario wheat is soft, and that for the production of a 

 strong flour, western wheat must be used. (I am told, how- 

 ever, that there is a small area near Ottawa which produces 

 a very hard wheat.) But all western wheat is not hard. A 

 sample received from Gretna, a town south of Winnipeg, 

 and just on the boundary line, is soft in comparison with a 

 sample from Portage la Prairie, about fifty miles west of 

 Winnipeg on the line of the C.P.E. These samples, on 

 careful examination, will show that the hard wheat is 

 darker in color than the soft — an experienced eye can 

 easily detect the difference in the two samples. 



With reference to this Portage la Prairie sample, I may 

 add that wheat grown in the same neighbourhood last sum- 



