Wheat Family

While researching this chapter, I sent my friend (who also happens to be a talented grain grower) the text—“HOW CAN SOMETHING SO SIMPLE BE SO COMPLICATED?!?!?!” This text shout of frustration came after several texts asking how this specific wheat is related to another and why it is called something else in Italian. Her response, “I’m not sure it is that simple. Wheat is very old. And the older something is, the more complex it tends to get.” Words to live by.

Wheat is very old. Over the last 10,000 years of cultivation, numerous species of wheat have been developed through natural selection (wild crosses picked up by foragers) and artificial selection (by farmers throughout domestication). That diversity of species, combined with the fact that wheat is grown across much of the globe, has added layers of identification, naming, and usage to the daily staple. Here’s how I think about wheat. I’m sure that a taxonomist would find flaws in this reasoning, but it works for me and I hope it clarifies something for you.