What is Sorghum? | MD F&H 

when I was in college at Texas Tech University, I worked a temp job, harvesting sorghum by hand! Yes! By hand! It was a seed company, Chromatin, that developed various strains of sorghum seeds. Each separate row of the crop field was a different strain of sorghum!! So we literally walked down the crop rows, with a knife, cutting each stalk by hand. Each row of crop was carefully grouped and tagged. And then we took it all back to the warehouse and threshed it all, by hand, and put the seeds into small pouches! All of the pouches are tagged and labeled and sent to the Crop Biology Genetics guys for analysis. And they mix it all together and experiment on making new resistant strains od sorghum! Was one of the most fascinating “hard labor” jobs I ever had as a college kid.

In Southern African countries it's a staple, we make bread from it, we make beer from it, we make coarse and fine meal for porridge. We call it Mabele in setswana.

Growing up in Texas, my dad would take me out early Saturday morning by the railroad tracks in Corpus Christi, and we would scoop up sorghum from along the tracks for the birds. Evertime the trains stopped they would leave a pile, so it was like sand dunes in some places, and once we spread it out on the driveway we would have waves of starlings just darken the sky when the feast began. For a little kid it was awesome.

sorghum is so easy to grow, i actually grew some by mistake and it spread across my yard along the fence.

Salute to all the farmers of the world🫡 I hope this reaches you and those you love in great health and happiness❤️🙏 Thank you again❤️

As mentioned in this clip, Sorghum is one of the major food grains in Africa, there's also Millet and inEthiopia a grain called Teff, all three very hardy and need little water. In Uganda during my childhood, we had Sorghum meals and porridge, very tasty and nutricious food.🌿🌾🌱

There used to be a sorghum festival in my hometown in eastern Ky when I was a kid. They’d have huge vats boiling syrup. Everyone would take a piece of stalk, dip it in the syrup, and chew on it. Sorghum molasses whipped with homemade butter on made-from scratch-biscuits is amazing!

I'm from Georgia. I grew up in Alabama. I've heard of sorghum syrup all my life. I live in a farming area and I've seen fields of sorghum growing. Still, I could never tell the stuff from Corn until it matures and I wasn't sure what all it was used for until watching this very informative video. Thanks. Incidentally, syrup was always a very popular food in the south in times past. Some still have an old cane mill. Most of our syrup comes from cane or corn but sorghum was also sometimes used. All during the Great Depression, about all some people (black and white alike) had to eat were biscuits and syrup according to my white parents and several black friends whose parents lived through the hard times.

In the language of Hausa from Nigeria, its called dawa. It's a great staple and higher in potein than the soft wheat that most people eat. It's also gluten free and requires less water when being grown.

As a Maryland resident I always wondered about this crop. This was a very interesting video. Our farmers sure know their profession.

I still see sorghum grown in Central Indiana. I have loved sorghum syrup/molasses since I was a kid, it was one of my parents favorite things to have with biscuits and I still love it!

We have been Eating Sorghum for centuries.... It's our staple food. We call it Jowar. We make Jowar Flour and then make rotis out of it.

My eastern Kentucky family dined on molasses made from sorghum and I can honestly say I have never heard this crop ever mentioned besides this fact. Interesting video! Thanks.

Sorghum is the most important crops in Amharan regions of Ethiopia. Sorghum first - fruit/unripe we cooked on fire it is so sweet and when it ripen boiled with water very delicious. Sorghum floors is good for bread and Ethiopian beverage (tella)

On my way to UP in West Memphis I would pass a sorghum field. One morning the farmer was present. Parked my bobtail and asked if I could have 2 heads . . . Why, he inquired. Got a neighbor with budgies. He gave me 5 and politely told me to help myself next harvest. This continued another 5 years. Hope that farmer knows I became the favorite interloper to them parakeets 💕

I've hunted over a large part of the U.S. and farmers in Maryland were the only ones to give me permission to hunt their land without wanting to charge me a lease fee. Maryland has very short hunting seasons and doesn't allow hunting on Sundays. So, crop depredation by game animals and birds is high, even though Maryland isn't known for it's numbers of game animals and birds. Lots of farmers welcome hunters to reduce the animal population and save their crops. I've hunted pheasant, dove, quail, ducks, geese and deer and never paid for access to their properties. I was just courteous when I asked and if told no, thanked them for their time and didn't cop an attitude. But, when they said yes, I made sure to shut gates when I was supposed to, I picked up my shell casings and any other trash I saw. I made sure to stay on the existing roads or trails when driving and didn't tear up the ground by driving in muddy conditions. In other words, I was respectful and was allowed to return numerous times. I wasn't ask by the farmers, but on most occasions I offered them some of the game I got. I found out that farmer's wives LOVE pheasants and venison!

Many years ago I was at a state fair. There was a man selling brooms that he made himself. I sort of half heard a conversation he was having with some people. Many years ago , he met an old man whose family had been share croppers. The family would walk in a circle through out the country following the harvest🧠. They would begin in Oregon, where they would harvest hops. And they would wind up in Oklahoma, where they would harvest sorghum. I believe that his brooms were sorghum. I regret that I did not include myself in that conversation. That oral history is fascinating.

I was born in zambia and brought up with sorghum. The beers nice and soupy. Like a food. Later in cape town we had a breakfast porridge called maltabella. That's how I grew up big and strong

Growing up in North Louisiana In the 1960’s my grandfather and I raised sorghum a couple of years. We’d harvest the tops to make syrup and sorghum rum. We had about twenty fourty pound pigs we’d graze on what was left. I guess it was a little less than twenty acres. The pigs grew plenty fast and the syrup was good on grandmas biscuits and the rum had a Good kick !

As someone from the western part of India this is interesting. We use it to make rotis or flat bread traditionally and it is considered very nutritious. Infact in my region wheat is a recent introduction and traditionally sorghum and a couple of other grains are used to make rotis.

Sounds like a crop we should be producing more of.

I had no idea what sorghum was either until Farming Simulator 22. Luckily, we can take it to a grain mill and make flour out of it. It was one of the new crops for 2022. In the video game, when you harvest it, it’s a really high yield harvest, I think the highest for the grain category.

Maryland Farm & Harvest actually sounded like a classic news clip. Well done!

First saw a crop of sorghum when I was driving through Utah. Took me a minute or two to realize what I was looking at. For my part, I've only ever known it for animal feed. Nice to see that it has interesting other uses as well. (As do most crops, when you step back from the primary usage and look at what really clever people have figured out what to do with it.)

I had them in my garden, because they look nice. And are also fantastic in dried flower bouquets.

Apparently this crop is also known as milo in certain areas.

Yes sorghum is my favorite food. In Somalia, we boil it with water and add maize. It's good, but you need to remove the eye to eat it like that. Among its properties it is good heart burn and stomach ulcers(when your inner stomach linings is badly scratched). For that you eat it with the eye. Also it's good if you are having hard times to shit. This is a really superfood.

My chickens love it! Just dry, as it is. And, me too! Soak it in water for a few hours, boil it 25 minutes and let it in the hot water for another 10 minutes. I use it instead of rice. Really good staple food you can easily grow yourself

as a Texan, who is not terribly familiar with East Coast American accents, other than like, the “famous” NY accent or New England accent or southern Georgia accent, I was very very surprised, and intrigued to hear this Maryland farmer speak with what I thought to be a “southern accent” in the way that I, a Texan, imagine it to be. Fascinating! But then the other guy, Gary Dell, had the sort of east coast accent I have heard before. Hmmm so interesting a father and son with two different accents. Well anyway, I love to learn about all of the English accents and dialects no matter where they are from. Maryland, Scotland, South Africa, Texas, Canada, all of it!

About 40 years ago central Texas grew many acres of "milo". This almost completely stopped and switch to corn. The benefits were corn could stand much longer and not fall over making combining much easier. An insect called midge became an issue with the germ or to meat inside the outer husk was eaten. Seed breeders created a smaller seed the made old style gravity flow obsolete. The rotating planter plate would grind the seed before it would drop into drop shoot. I would estimate at least a 90% drop in acreage due these many issues.

The smaller the grain the healthier, the fewer calories, and the more drought tolerant it tends to be. In the USA we've generally gone for "most calories" and "shelf stable", so our crops tend to suck in other categories. Strange how we feed our more nutritious grains, such as Sorghum to wild animals, eh?

Out here in the oklahoma panhandle we just call it milo.

As Africans we abandoned these kind of crops that are well designed to grow & strive in our environments requiring less water, and instead we chase crops like wheat & corn that require more water and are not suitable to grow in many parts of our lands

Sorghum syrup is a common food item here in eastern Kentucky. People make it and sell out on the roadsides in the fall.

Sorghum grown in Southeast Colorado is primarily used as animal feed, it can be ground or cracked then used similar to corn for cattle, sheep, goats, horses, and pigs. If ground fine enough one can separate out a coarse flour, as a youth my grandmother used this flour mixed with some wheat flour for cooking, one of my favorites was as a muffin...warm from the oven, fresh butter melting in with honey, jelly or jam spread over the top, but they were great just as muffins. Sorghum is known for growing using less water than corn on our dryland acres and under long periods of dry growing with annual rainfall in the 13 inches per year range, thus gains of organic matter is highly dependent on annual rainfall. Chemical choices to combat weeds are very limited due to rainfall and being a lesser grain crop after corn and wheat for income potential. Once anyone has harvested sorghum you learn the "dust" is very itchy compared to corn or wheat too.

I live in central Missouri and it is grown here. Soybeans rotated with corn are king but I do see it from time to tome. It is used here for feed and also making molasses. I used to buy it from the Amish and it was very good.

Thank you for tell us all on RU-vid Mrs. Maryland farm girl.

On the Eastern Shore of Maryland, they were Harvesting Wheat, this was followed by Corn, Millet Seed/Sorghum, Soybeans or Clover. Then for a Fall Crop, Cabbage , Broccoli, or Brussel Sprouts. Then back to wheat. Three Crops a year.

I am a Floridian that happened upon your channel. I like farming videos and you popped up in my feed. Very good video. I had heard of Sorghum but did not have an idea what it was used for. Thanks. The funny thing is, I actually do business in Maryland and Virginia and may have passed by these fields.

Sorghum is our one of our staple foods in Botswana. You'll find it in almost all households of the 'Tswana' tribes.

Sorghum bicolor, commonly called sorghum and also known as great millet, broomcorn, guinea corn, durra, imphee, jowar, or milo, is a grass species cultivated for its grain, which is used for food for humans, animal feed, and ethanol production.

That’s a very good video. I’m wondering why you only have 15k subscribers. I felt like I was watching a story from a major news network. Great job!

In Oklahoma I plant MILO and Sorghum for wildlife.

I saw sorghum growing 60 years ago in southern MO. I remember a wonderful time as a "city boy" visiting family friends grandparents there as a 7 seven year old. That one wee made such an impression on me.

I thought I had some mutant corn growing from a bird that dropped some seed. Apparently it was sorghum! Wow! We let it grow to watch and were a little disturbed. Now we know it was sorghum!!! Mystery solved!! Thank you!

When I was a kid, in Missouri, sorghum molasses was always on the table. My Grandfather especially loved it.

I was'nt sure what a farmer had planted near me. This is what it was. Sorghum. I used to work on a farm as a teen. But i never saw this. I live in central NY.

Finally thank you 🙏✊all farmers ☝️🇺🇸🌎

I grew up eating sorghum molasses mixed with butter and spread on my bread At my grandmother's house .it was delicious!

This answered several questions I didn't even know I had. Thanks!

Nice seeing a combine running without gps (at least it appeared that way).

What a fantastic, uplifting video. Thank you!

Here in Delaware, I have seen quite an increase in sorghum this year. Last year there was one field. This year I have seen at least 7 and I come across more every time I have to go to a different place around here.

I loved stumbling on to this channel. I'll be looking to sorghum to try and grow alongside corn.

It is also good cover and food for pheasants and quail.

I'm such a geek, I LOVE video's like this ever since I was a kid watching "educational" films in grade school!!

I watched as a five yoar old, growing up in central Alabama, a mule walking in circles around a rolling stone sorghum press and watched the fluid being squeezed out into a large metal tank set in rock, over a roaring fire ... and being boiled down to molasses. Grandaddy fed cattle .. livestock, and US, delicious sorghum syrup with oven fired, baked homemade biscuits. ummm ... GOOD!

Growing up in Kentucky back in the 1960s, breakfast was always 1 piece of bacon, one egg and a biscuit with sorghum molasses.

Sorghum waste material (stalk and foliage) also processes and degrades easier. Sorgum is also easier on the soil than corn.

Growing up in East Texas it was important to befriend the farmers... we loved the sorghum fields just after harvest... The doves loved the sorghum and it made for some fantastic wing shooting as the doves came to fed. First day of dove hunting season was a school holiday.

Excellently edited and presented! Thanks for sharing and best of luck!

When my dad was helping on the farms growing up in the 1960s in Northern MN, they would plant corn and sorghum next to each other and run the chopper through it for silage.

Nice video. Informative and well produced. Thanks from San Diego.

Helped harvest sorghum in South Africa 🇿🇦 in the 1960s and 1970s, one by one, by hand, with tinny little BEST pocket knives. Combine harvesters for this crop didn't exist then in this country, and we did our bit as we were visitors from a thousand miles away.

Sorghum is one of the oldest grains humanity has ever farmed.

Quail and pheasant love it. Hunted near it in Kansas.Ate some milo porridge as a kid in Pennsylvania.

Good story. Good work. Thanks from Philly

Have heard of Sorghum but knew nothing about it. Very informative. Now I would like to try the syrup. Thanks for this agricultural teaching lesson. 👍

Thanks for the video. I ate a lot of sorghum molasses and biscuits growing up. Loved it.

TQ for sharing; a topic that is totally new to us, the Concert forest dweller here from Singapore.

Lord, honey, down here in Alabama we've been eating sorghum syrup at breakfast for all my long life--63 years! So so good

So awesome, I live in the Pacific NW and feed the birds in the Winter, this Summer we had these new plants sprouting on oue property that looked like the begining of corn plants then changed to what looked like millet, but not. I figured whatever they were, they were hardy, beautiful, came from the bird seed and were still feeding this years birds, a win win situation... TY for this great video... awesome!!!

Thanks for the information. I grew up in Indiana and all I really pieced together about the crop was that it was grown in fields sometimes that had poor soil and no irrigation. From what I understand, the price it commands is not that great compared to corn or soybeans but it seems to have its uses in places with less rainfall and poorer soil quality.

Thanks for the education on Sorghum! I always wondered what is was and how it grew and what it looked like.

It's eaten as a porridge here in South Africa. Commercially it's often mixed with other grains to make a super nutritional cereal.

This is my first time hearing about this crop. Iv seen it, but didnt know what it was. Now i know. Great video!

Much respect to the farmer's 👍

Every year the little town in Oklahoma that my dad grew up in would have what's called "Sorghum Day" in the Fall. It's essentially like a mini fair where the food is centered around Sorghum. As a kid, I wasn't a fan of the taste of Sorghum syrup, but it grew on me as I got older. Even though it's about an hour's drive away, I try to attend every year to restock on some fresh and local Sorghum syrup. Tastes similar to Molasses, but the flavor has a lot more "depth" if that makes sense. Almost like how a sharp cheddar cheese is compared to a mild cheddar.

Interesting program - thanks.

We also it's mixed with oats for horses. They love the heck out of it.😋

I helped on my uncle's farm in Nebraska 1n the mid 70's and gew sorghum but we called it Milo.

Sorghum is a staple in northern Somalia. We grind it down to make a fermented batter for pancakes called Lahoh which is eaten daily. It is also eaten whole with yogurt, butter and honey or with a spicy meat stew if you want it savoury. I believe most of the Sorghum we eat comes from the USA as it says it is a product of Kansas, USA on the large sacks.

We grew it on fanily farm since the 60s in NEKS, but we used it as cattle feed, also we call it milo here...

Excellent reporting!

Very informative, nicely done. I'll be looking for a similar video on another big crop in Maryland: turf or sod. I'm wondering how the topsoil harvested with the grass gets restored.

I grew up in Missouri calling it milo

Love sorghum been around for ever been used as a food source for ever.

I noticed farms growing this in central Pennsylvania over the last few years, and was wondering what it was.

Very interesting subject. Thank you.

Thank you for sharing this video very good work and information 👍

Well thankyou! You know I grew up in an area surrounded by sorghum farms, and I had no idea what sorghum was, now I know! I’m definitely going to look for some flour to try it in pancakes.

Nice hedge against a bad corn year.

I am a farmer in Arkansas and grow it occasionally when prices are up but not often as we focus on cotton,soybeans,corn,rice and wheat.Used alot in birdseed as a filler 4 weight as not many songbirds will touch it.A dove is about the only good bird 2 eat it.

Thanks for the education!

Apparently this crop is also known as milo in certain areas.. Excellently edited and presented! Thanks for sharing and best of luck!.

I grow it...I love to watch it grow and combining it.

I have roof deck planters at my house near San Francisco. I grow carrots, squash, and Yukon gold potatoes in several planters. To my surprise, I thought corn was growing in one of them. Holy smokes, its sorghum! What a surprise! I intend to make sorghum popcorn with it.

We grew lots of it in the TX panhandle and called it "Feed" since it was grown for use as cattle feed.

in Rwanda, sorghum is a traditional food. it is consumed as porridge and pasta,

I have recently Started adding it to every soup ..and stew .. it has a lovely Crunch .. and taste .. and does not get Mushy even after cooked for 2 hrs in pressure cooker recipe .. very healthy ..