Wheat Harvesting in United States

About 60 million acres of wheat are harvested each year in the United States. The wheat harvest will usually start in early May in southern Texas reach its peak in the hard red winter areas of the Southwest in early June, and end in October in the northern portions of the red spring wheat area.

Method of harvesting grains using binder used many years ago and it has been replaced nearly everywhere by combines, large and small. Currently wheat farms are larger, more individual wheat farmers can afford their own combines.

Combining machines cut and thresh the crop and are usually self-propelled. Spring wheat may be cut windrowed or swathed before threshing.

Cylinder speed, moisture at harvest and the amount of grain damage are all interrelated. In general, damage occurs whenever grain is harvested. It increases significantly, on extremely wet or extremely dry grain.

Most spring and winter wheat is either stored in the farms for a time or promptly taken by truck to local elevators it is loaded on railway cars and carried to terminal markets.

Soft red winter wheat is often stored in the farm, since smaller amounts are produced in the region and adequate storage facilities are not prohibitive in cost.

Both farm storage and huge cooperative terminal storage facilities are common in the major wheat producing areas, where government programs in some years subsidize both types of storage.

The primary used for wheat is four but it is also used for brewing and distilling and for making oil, gluten, straw for livestock bedding, livestock feed, hay or silage, newsprint and other products.
Wheat Harvesting in United States