Wheat Harvest

Summer is a very busy time here at SP. We've harvested the first calendula flowers and now it's time to harvest our wonderful wheat. I had a few questions (Jo here) about how we harvest the wheat and Dawn and Katie were very happy to answer a few.....

1. How do you know when the wheat is ready to harvest? What do you look for?

We check the wheat every few days to check the colour, whether the "petals" have dropped, how full the kernels are and how firm the stems of wheat are.

The wheat: 22nd June 

The above photo was taken last week and you can see that the wheat is very green and the kernels aren't very full. Rose calls the hairs on the wheat their 'petals' because when the hairs have dropped, the wheat is ready to harvest so we call this the 'petal drop'. By looking at all of these things, we knew that the wheat wasn't ready to harvest last week.

The wheat: 29th June 

When we looked at the wheat yesterday it had turned more golden, the stems were firm, the kernels were much fuller and the hairs had dropped slightly so we were good to go! We always harvest the wheat when it's still nice and green because over time, if it is exposed to sunlight it will turn golden, but you would never be able to get it this lovely green colour again.

2. How do you harvest the wheat?

Like the flowers, the wheat is all harvested by hand. Mark has a mower that he uses to cut the wheat, which is then collected.

Harvesting the wheat 

The wheat is secured into bunches and hung up on the stillages.

3. Why is the wheat hung up when it's harvested?

The wheat has been harvested by hand and hung up on stillages for a very long time here at Shropshire Petals! The wheat is hung up so that the bunches keep their shape and are able to dry. There is a small space between each bunch to allow air circulation around each bunch.

4. How is the wheat dried?

The wheat is air dried hanging on the stillages. The wheat has to be completely dry - which takes a very long time! If there's any moisture left in the wheat it will go mouldy when it's stored.

5. How much wheat is being harvested this year and how long will it last?

We're hoping to harvest 10,000 bunches of wheat this year which we will use for the next 12 months for our wheat bunches, wheat sheaves and wheat wreaths. Dried wheat will keep indefinitely if stored correctly.

Now you know what goes into harvesting our wonderful wheat!

Love as always, SP x x