Ergot and Grading

[wd9]

Why is Ergot a grading consideration. Its cleaned out of the wheat and does not affect milling quality. Shouldn't it just be dockage?

[FarmRanger]

I think it's hard to get it all out, which I suppose
is why it becomes a grading issue.

[mbratrud]

Look for a Grain Terminal that has a density cleaner (Camas) and they will likely run a cleaning program. Also private seed cleaning plants with Gravity can have some success with this.

Depending an where you are from. Cargil Edmonton ATL, Viterra Saskatoon and Weyburn Inland Terminal are examples of companies with these types of cleaners that have ran programs in the past. Most times can clean it to a #2.

Good Luck shop around.

[TOM4CWB]

wd9,

Star Viterra has a colour sorter... as does Providence Grain Gaudin and Holden cleaning plant.

The ergot is in most years blended out.

50 cents a Bu cleans it out with a colour sorter. Not much less for a gravity which gets most ergot out... but not like a colour sorter.

After cleaning seed we put the screenings through to colour sorter and it got 100 percent of the ergot... with about a 15 percent clean out.

Lougheed seed cleaning Coop is pelleting these screenings for stove fuels and a green alternative for coal(like in heating greenhouses etc.) They start in Sept 11 and have bulk truckloads or bags. ARC has said they burn clean, and have low ash compared to straight grain. Most dumps Don't want the ergot... so the screenings become a liability.

[wd9]

Thankyou for the answers!

[bucket]

Ergot can be cleaned out and since farmers pay cleaning charges - it should be up to the cwb and the grain companies.

Most years they don't even have to clean at dockage levels under 3%. Contracts allow more than that - remember the deer poop incident,

[bucket]

Also, I phoned the cwb to have an ergot program put in place like the fusarium that happens every year and they knew nothing.

[poorboy]

I have been battling ergot for several years. It is mostly environment. All can feed last year due to ergot, can't even find any in the wheat this year. No management changes.

It is not the big pieces of ergot that is the problem. That comes out in the dockage and the wheat is graded after dockage removal. It is the pieces of ergot that are the same size as the wheat kernel that are the problem. Have them show you at the elevator when they do your grading.

[wd9]

Does anyone know if millers use gravity tables or just aspirate and screening?

[poorboy]

One grain buyer told me that they do a quick wash on the grain before milling and the ergot actually floats to the top and is easily removed.

Never did find out if this is true or not.

[BTOfarmallll]

Why not make $100,000 an Acre or more from The Ergot. Dump The Wheat in The Bush, Bird Food. Do what Albert Hofmann did in 1938 and Crush it into LSD. Wasn't Pastey lookin fer some New Markets???? Think I may have found it!!!!!!!!!

[wd9]

Well it did probably cause the witch burning of Salem because it is a hallucinogen.

[Braveheart]

That's true wd9. Also, LSD is made from distilling ergot. Even the brown acid that was the bad stuff causing the bummers at Woodstock.

[wd9]

Hmmmm i see a new marketing opportunity. Seems like an endless supply, and like refine extra, a byproduct of no value looking for an application to profit from.

[mcfarms]

So if I take a truckload of wheat across the line this fall, do I get charged under the customs act or the narcotics trafficing act?
Its all very confusing I need to lie down and have some more ergot errr aspirin.
Damn I've been chewing the wrong stuff out of the heads for years.

Of course living where I do, I now have a sideline business to go with the round bales of pot I've been thinking of growing under the pivots.