That the fertility of land used for the growth of wheat is improved by growing upon it a crop of beans or clover has been long recognized by farmers.
One is the large-kernel winter wheat of the Eastern states; the other is the hard spring wheat.
Under such conditions of the soil, the land, nevertheless, produces crops of wheat and other grain from fifteen to forty fold.
In these provinces spring wheat is almost universally sown, except in Alberta where fall or winter wheat is also sown to a considerable extent.
The stamens of the wheat plant may frequently be seen protruding beyond the glumes, and their position might lead to the inference that cross-fertilization was the rule; but on closer examination it will be found that the anthers are empty or nearly so, and that they are not protruded till after they have deposited the pollen upon the stigma.
The chief wheat lands are in Victoria, South Australia and New South Wales; the yield averages about 9 bushels to the acre; this low average is due to the endeavour of settlers on new lands to cultivate larger areas than their resources can effectively deal with; the introduction of scientific farming should almost double the yield.
The snow and the frost in the ground are considered useful as furnishing moisture to start the wheat in spring.
At one time Chile supplied Argentina and the entire West Coast as far north as California with wheat, but Argentina and California have become wheat producers and exporters, and Chile has been driven from all her old consuming markets.
The ant was carrying a grain of wheat as large as itself.
In November the waters have passed off; and whenever a man can walk over the mud with a pair of bullocks, it is roughly turned over with a wooden plough, or merely the branch of a tree, and the wheat or barley crop is immediately sown.