Science and Technology for Canadians

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Summary

Shortly after the dawn of the 20th century, Charles Saunders, Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada's 'Experimentalist', developed Marquis wheat, which did as much as the railroad to open up the Canadian Prairies to settlement. In 1911, Marquis wheat was judged as the best hard spring wheat in North America by prairie farmers. Developing crop varieties that will flourish under Canadian weather conditions has had an enormous impact on the people of this country.

Transcript of Video

Gillian Deacon
The next time you bite into a piece of bread, spare a thought for William Saunders and his sons, because they helped to develop the wheat that makes your daily bread.

All week on Earth Tones, we'll be examining some of the environmental accomplishments that shape our lives, starting with the grandfather of Canadian wheat.

Jay Ingram (voice-over)
About 25-million acres of wheat are grown on Canada's prairies every year... that's an area almost as big as Newfoundland... and it produces about one billion bushels of wheat! Much of today's bumper crop owes it's success to just 12 grains of wheat, bred almost a hundred years ago.

Back then, prairie farmers were looking for a good wheat to grow - a hard wheat that had high protein content and made good bread, a wheat that could be sown in the spring, and had a short growing season.

George Fedak
Yes, there was a problem in western Canada back in those days. The wheats that they were growing in those days were fine for quality but they were too late in maturing so any time they had an early fall frost, these varieties would just fail and the harvest would be a total loss.

Jay Ingram
To the rescue came Dr. William Saunders, the director of the Experimental Farm Service, and his sons, Charles and Percy. The Saunders collected wheat samples from all over the world, and began to breed them with local strains. After years of effort, and meticulous record keeping, Charles Saunders bred a strain named Marquis. It looked promising... but would it make good bread?

These days we have sophisticated ways of accurately gauging the baking quality of wheat. Machines and computers can tell us how much good bread-making protein there is in any particular wheat sample. But a hundred years ago, things were a little more organic. To learn about the baking quality of Marquis wheat, Charles Saunders used his famous chewing test. George Fedak demonstrates. He popped some whole grains into his mouth and chewed... and chewed... and chewed... and chewed... and then chewed some more until the wheat turned into a mushy wad.

George Fedak
This is a sample of Marquis wheat and this is how Charles Saunders selected it for high bread making quality. As you can see this wheat is very elastic... it's got a very strong protein, and therefore it's got a very high bread making quality.

Jay Ingram
After chewing Marquis wheat, Charles Saunders reached the same conclusion. He planted the 12 grains that remained after his chewing test... and the rest is the history of a real winner.

George Fedak
The first major award that Marquis wheat won was in 1911 and this was a prize of $1000 in gold for the best sample of hard red spring wheat grown in North America.

Jay Ingram
Marquis couldn't compete with today's wheats. They have higher yields, shorter growing seasons, and more disease resistance than Marquis had. Nonetheless, even today, most varieties of hard red spring wheat grown around the world owe at least some of their good genes to Marquis... the Canadian great granddaddy of prairie wheat.

Earth Tones is produced in co-operation with Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada.