[Pil-pc-oceania] threshing sorghum and crushing sugar cane

[Robyn Williamson]

Hi Ruth

Interestingly, I heard Phillip Adams talking about seedsaving on the  
radio tonight and he was saying that sorghum seed has a use-by date  
of up to 10,000 years ... yes, that's ten thousand years!

Below is an extract from a document about sorghum on the fao.org  
website:

Best regards,
Robyn

PS:  Are you coming to APC9?  Looking forward to catching up with you.

***************************************
2.4 Threshing

In rural Africa, threshing involves beating the dried sorghum  
panicles with sticks on the ground or in sacks, or using a mortar and  
pestle. Grain is separated from dirt and chaff by winnowing. The time  
required for threshing depends on variety, the degree of dryness of  
the grain, and the method of threshing. In some places in India, a  
common practice for threshing the grain is to place it on the road  
for vehicles to run over. It has been recorded that 2-4 ha of grain  
(approx. 1-2 tons) can be threshed on the road in one day by a few  
people. Normally about 35 labourers are required to thresh about one  
half hectare (300-400 kg).

General guidelines for improved threshing efficiency and yield at  
rural level:

To reduce the amount of winnowing, thresh the panicles on mats, adobe  
or cement blocks, not on sand, gravel or stones;

Thresh early to reduce field exposure to birds, rats, etc. (ensure  
that the moisture content is low enough);

Maximum moisture content of the grain before storage should be 10-12  
percentage;

Vitreous, flinty-starch type sorghums should be threshed early to  
reduce the number of broken grains.

The grain may be stored as unthreshed panicles or threshed before  
storage. Both storage methods are practised, but small-scale  
producers tend to store the grains unthreshed.

In many developing countries, motorised threshers have found mixed  
acceptability due to breakage of softer varieties of grain, problems  
of machine maintenance, and availability of spare parts. They operate  
by passing the grain-bearing panicles between a moving rotor and a  
fixed metal plate. The loosened grains and panicle fibres are  
separated in a forced air current.

Where farms are sufficiently large, threshing can be achieved using  
mechanical combines at the time of harvest (Vogell and Graham, 1979).


CONTACT DETAILS:

Robyn Williamson
APC9 Secretariat
info at apc9.org.au
Ph/Fx:  (02) 9629 3560
Mobile:  0409 151 435
http://apc9.org.au



On 25/01/2008, at 8:03 AM, Ruth Rosenhek wrote:

> Hi, anybody know how we might hand thresh sorghum?
> Also, we're looking for a hand operated sugar cane crusher. any  
> suggestions?
>
> for the Earth
> Ruth
>
>
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