Better than Pumpkin Spice for HARVEST season.

 

Harvest season! So much more than pumpkin spice. :-) 

Although happy images of pumpkins, Halloween, and Thanksgiving spring to mind, harvest season is a historically labor-intensive, make-or-break season for farm families.

In the northern hemisphere, the months of September, October and November are massed together as autumn, or possibly frequently known as: harvest.

IMPACT OF THE HARVEST

The harvest sets the conditions for families to make it through the winter, anas well asd planting and growing seasons. The fate depends on the final evaluation of a successful or a poor crop.

A photo of bountiful harvest. A farmer is driving a John Deere tractor while a green combine harvester pours harvested field corn into the cart.

Field corn makes up 90% of the corn crop. It's generally used to feed livestock and is not typically eaten by humans. The other 10% of the corn crop is sweet corn, popcorn, and I don't know what else. 

I was reared in Nebraska and am so proud of the farming heritage of the state. Here is some info on the corn crop in Nebraska:

"Nebraska farmers are growing more corn than ever—twice as much as they did 100 years ago on two-thirds less land. Nebraska has produced the largest corn crop of any state for more than two decades. In an average year, Nebraska produces more corn than most whole countries. For example, Nebraska grows three times as much corn as a country like Argentina."

Amaizing-Corn-Activity-Book_NEW_09-25-13 (1).pdf

This is why Nebraskkans are called "Cornhuskers." 

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World events and globall economies have changed based on the outcome of harvests.

Think about the impact of the mold contamination of the potato crop in the Irish Potato Famine. Also known as the Great Hunger. It started in 1845, and for several seasons crops of potatoes were ruined. For some families, their entire livelihood and income was wiped out. For many it was the only crop they grew: a family could survive on the potatoes grown on it's small plot of land.

And the virus continued to get worse. Approximately one million people died. Nearly two million people fled Ireland due to starvation. Their migration changed the economies, ethnicities, and politics of Europe and the US.

Or, consider the virus that caused the ”tulip mania."

It was named the "tulip breaking virus", because it "breaks" the one petal colour into two or more." It gave some tulips vivid eye-popping patterns of stripes in the petals. This virus vastly improved the collectability and attractiveness of the tulips and created an explosive speculative market for tulips. Sort of the 17th Century crypto market. Due to the virus, fortunes were made and lost in this tulip market.  In this case, the harvest for some growers or vendors consisted of a single tulip bulb. 

HARVEST ARTWORK

Historically harvest artwork is a relevant topic to most people.

Migration to urban areas disconnected people from the season of harvest – except for our anticipation of pumpkin spiced lattes, Halloween, Thanksgiving, and of course pumpkins for carving as Jack-o-lanterns.

THE HARVESTERS

This powerful painting, The Harvesters, by Pieter Bruegel the Elder, (1525-1569) shows a beautiful, golden wheat field. The men in the field have used a scythe to slice the wheat stalks close to the ground.

The men are visibly exhausted as the hot day beats down. The women would have been cooking over campfires for hours in preparation of bringing food to the workers in the fields. The midday meal was called supper and was the heartiest of the day. This being the Netherlands, there is plenty of bread and cheese in the offering. Probably quite a bit of beer, too. (I’m just guessing.)

Some women seem to be eating some sort of porridge. Some are eating pears. We can see pears on a white cloth and we see women picking pears in the back right-hand corner.

One woman in the field is bundling the stalks into sheaves of wheat. After bundling, each sheaf is balanced to help it stay dry and avoid being blown around by the wind. In the background on the left, we can see an enormous stack of wheat on a horse-drawn wagon on a road. There are more wheat fields in the distance.

Without successful wheat harvests over the past 10,000 years, we would not have bread as we know it. Although other grains and legumes can be used to make bread, wheat is the most grown crop in the world; 90% of the wheat production is used for bread.

Planting wheat in the MIdwest with a John Deere twin row planter. 

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WHEAT HARVEST VS. HAY HARVEST

Some definitions are in order. As a non-farmer, I've been confused about the words “wheat,” “hay” and “straw."

Straw is not a crop in itself. Is a byproduct of the process of harvesting crops in the grass or ceral family, like wheat, barley, oats and rye. 

Wheat is a grain that is generally grown for its kernel which is separated from the stalk and ground into flour. The stalks can be used for other things including straw for bedding and the grassy part can be used for weaving.  Wheat straw has no nutritional value so is not used for feed.

Hay, is used for animal feed. It iis grown from grasses. Alfalfa (which we can buy for our families as alfalfa sprouts) is the dominant grass used for hay because it has such a high nutritional value. Other grasses can be used for hay, too, when needed.

It’s noteworthy that there is even confusion about whether Monet’s series of “stacks" portrayed wheat, hay, or oats. The obvious subject of each painting is a stack (or several stacks) of harvested crops. The French title, “Les Meules à Giverny” translates simply as “The Stacks at Giverny.” The series is known in English as “The Wheatstacks” and also “The Haystacks." So, take your pick. I think they are haystacks, because wheat would need to be stored differently to best capitalize on the wheat kernel.

As we breeze through this season with our pumpkin spiced lattes, pumpkin bread, or even our popcorn and Wheaties, please thank a farmer. It is an expensive, high risk, complicated, seven-days a week career. We are blessed with the abundance they produce for us. 

Let me know what you think of this essay. Have you worked on harvests? Do you have a favorite harvest stories?