Growing barley

[Nicos]

Ooops!...sorry about that!

As you were gentlemen......

[Zelenina]

Ordinary barley is apparently difficult to thresh, but you can get hulless varieties (or should that have three Ls?) that are much easier. Some American seed companies stock it. Here in Slovakia you can buy packets of it in health food shops, meant for cooking and eating but it would probably grow fine. I've had some in my stash for a while that I've been intending to grow, but it might be too old now. I'm also doubtful about pearl barley, but you could try a test germination.

[4Shoes]

When I was a kid, we grew Golden Promise on the farm for the Malting plant at Invergordon. This is a spring barley. Good for whiskey, but was long stemmed and tended to flatten after heavy rain late summer. Winter Barley harvest late July in NE, Spring Barley Late August.

[snakeshack]

Looks like my best bet is going to be kings seeds,but it may be too late to plant as they suggest autumn planting,but you can plant in spring too but that delays the harvest till late August

[4Shoes]

Aye, just missed the bus for winter barley. See it is that famous "unlabelled and Unknown" variety . And it is not suitable for spring sawing. If you are in a mild area and we have a mild winter / or you cover it, you might get away with it. Cold wet weather and soil is the real killer for barley.

If you are in the county, go to your local pub and ask if anyone prepared to give you a couple of handfuls / sample.

No point visiting your local chicken pall because barley is bad for them.

[4Shoes]

LOL just looked at your profile.

You are your chicken pall.... sorry for any offence.

I've still to build the chicken pens and huts. One for over Christmas.

[the big lebowski]

hi ,very interested to know how much id need to grow to make a a 25 liter batch of beer ? "were not looking to make white lightning " well i was kinda looking into doing that too
cheers

[Jay-ell]

hi ,very interested to know how much id need to grow to make a a 25 liter batch of beer ? "were not looking to make white lightning " well i was kinda looking into doing that too
cheers

Please keep the conversation on the legal side and keep off the topic of illegal distillation and moonshine

[the big lebowski]

yep fair enough mate

[snakeshack]

As the grain bill for a 5 gallon batch uses about 5-6 kilos of malted barley ,I'm guessing you would need 7-8 kilos of grain to allow for drying and processing

[the big lebowski]

ok great thanks ,how much space roughly would in need to grow that amount ? cheers

[Jimny14]

The article I put a link upto a couple of pages back reckons 10sq ft yields between 5 and 15 lbs of grain so that would be approx 2.25 to 6.75kg per 10sq ft bed.