587.742.6023Sign inSell grainMalt barley and feed barley: what separates them
The Canadian Grain Commission divides barley into three classes by end use (malting, food and general purpose), and “feed barley” isn’t one of them. There’s exactly one malting grade, Select, and only designated varieties are eligible for it. The rest is the general purpose class, which the CGC says goes primarily to animal feed. The number that matters to a grower is this: only about 20 percent of malting barley production is actually selected for malting each year. The other 80 percent is fed, exported as feed, or selected for food.
Three things farmers hear mashed together
They are three, and they fail independently:
- Variety eligibility. Is what you seeded on the malting barley variety designation list? Only designated varieties are eligible for the malting grades.
- CGC grade. What the official determinant table says your lot is. For malt that’s Select; for everything else it’s usually No. 1 or No. 2 CW General Purpose.
- Buyer acceptance. Whether a maltster or the grain company contracting for one will actually take your lot, at their own specification, in a year when they still need it.
You can seed a designated variety, harvest excellent physical quality, grade perfectly well, and still not be selected. That’s the third thing, and it’s the one that decides the cheque.
“CW Feed Barley” isn’t a grade
It’s a market term. Most sound western feed barley is graded under Barley, Canada Western General Purpose, typically No. 1 CW or No. 2 CW. Name the real grade in the contract, because a grade that doesn’t exist has no determinant table behind it when a load is challenged at the pit.
What General Purpose barley has to hit, and where a light lot lands
A lot that misses those thresholds falls to a Sample CW Account Light Weight or another Sample grade rather than simply becoming “feed”. The primary determinants for Barley, Canada Western General Purpose follow. Every figure is the CGC’s, in the CGC’s own units.
| Factor | No. 1 CW | No. 2 CW |
|---|---|---|
| Minimum test weight | 63 kg/hL | 57 kg/hL |
| Broken | 15% | 25% |
| Sprouted | 10% | 20% |
| Fusarium damage | 1.0% | 1.0% |
| Heated, rotted, severely mildewed | 0.5% | 2.5% |
| Wild oats | 1.0% | 2.5% |
| Other cereal grains | 2.5% | 8.0% |
| Total foreign material | 2.5% | 10.0% |
| Ergot | 0.1% | 0.1% |
Notice what the gap between the two columns is worth. Broken goes from 15% to 25%, total foreign material from 2.5% to 10%, sprouted from 10% to 20%. One grade down is a much wider tolerance, and buyers price that difference.
The 48 pound number on your contract
A 48 pound per bushel minimum is on contracts everywhere and in no grading table. It’s a buyer specification, not a CGC grade threshold: the official minimums are 63 kg/hL for No. 1 CW and 57 for No. 2 CW. When a contract says “48 lb/bu”, ask which basis the buyer’s tester uses, or ask for the specification in kg/hL, which is unambiguous.
Why we won’t tell you which grade 48 pounds sits between
The reason is worth more than the answer would be. The CGC publishes two different pound-per-bushel conversions. On the Avery basis 63 kg/hL is about 50.5 lb; on the Winchester basis the same grain is about 47.0 lb. So the same 48 pound contract clause sits below No. 1 CW on one basis and above it on the other. Anyone who tells you where 48 sits without naming the basis is guessing.
And don’t confuse it with the other 48. Giddyupp divides by 48 pounds to turn a tonne price into a bushel price, and that 48 is a unit definition. It’s how much barley the trade agrees a bushel is, not a measurement of your load. A contract minimum of 48 lb/bu is a density threshold your load either meets or doesn’t. Same number, two different jobs, and the conversion guide has a section on exactly that, along with the Imperial and Winchester bushel sizes behind it.
On malt, the contract is the standard
The CGC’s malting barley determinant table, for Select Malting CW in its two-row, six-row and hulless forms, prints no protein window and no minimum test weight at all. So get the protein window, the germination requirement and the plump and thin percentages written into the contract before the truck moves. Unlike General Purpose barley, there’s no neutral document to appeal to afterwards.
What the CGC does set, and what actually decides acceptance
The malting table sets variety eligibility and limits on things like frost, fusarium, heated kernels, ergot and admixture. Protein isn’t among them. That doesn’t mean protein doesn’t matter. It means the CGC isn’t the one setting it. Protein targets differ between maltsters and between the markets they sell into, and they move between crop years. So does everything else that decides acceptance: germination (the industry minimum is 95%), varietal purity, moisture, kernel plumpness, peeled and broken kernels, disease, and pre-harvest sprouting.
Malt isn’t a crop you harvest. It’s a lot somebody selects.
You grow an eligible malting variety and try to produce a lot a buyer will select. Variety choice, lining a buyer up before you seed, agronomy, harvest timing and storage can all substantially improve your odds. Final acceptance still depends on the harvested quality and on what malt buyers need that year.
Who selects, and when the decisions are really made
Two corrections to the way this usually gets told. The selecting buyer is often a grain company contracting on behalf of a maltster or an export customer, not the maltster directly. And the important decisions aren’t all made after harvest. Choosing a variety with real buyer demand behind it, and securing a contract, happen before seeding. That’s where a grower has the most leverage.
What a grower doesn’t control: the weather, the year’s protein distribution across the prairies, export demand, and whether a particular buyer already has enough of that variety.
So what happens to the barley that isn’t selected?
Mostly it’s fed. About 20 percent of malting barley production is selected for malting. The other 80 percent goes to domestic livestock feed, is exported as feed barley, or is selected for food. Feed is the fallback market, not a fallback price. Your lot still has to meet the feed buyer’s specifications, and it can grade Sample on light weight or another defect. The feed market will also have moved by the time a malt rejection lands.
Which is the honest argument for knowing your feed number early rather than late. Name your town on the barley page and it shows what feed barley nets at your own gate, with the trucking and our fee already off.
What Giddyupp does and doesn’t quote
We broker feed barley and we don’t run a malt program. If you have malt barley to move, a maltster or a malt-focused merchant will serve you better on that load. We’ll say so rather than take the call. Where we’re useful on a malt-variety field is what the feed market nets at your gate. Then you know what you’re choosing between before you decide whether to hold for selection. Or ask us; that question is free.
Questions farmers ask
The Canadian Grain Commission divides barley into three classes by end use: malting, food and general purpose. There’s one malting grade, Select, and only varieties on the malting barley variety designation list are eligible for it. What the trade calls feed barley is mostly the general purpose class, which the CGC says is used primarily for animal feed. So the difference isn’t a quality line on a ticket. It’s whether a buyer selected your lot for malt, and only about 20 percent of malting barley production is selected each year.
No. It’s a market term, not a Canadian Grain Commission grade or class. Most sound western feed barley is officially graded under Barley, Canada Western General Purpose, typically No. 1 CW or No. 2 CW, though a lot that misses those can fall to a Sample grade instead. It matters because a contract written against a grade that doesn’t exist has no published determinant table behind it, so what counts as a miss is whatever the buyer says it is.
Whatever the buyer asks for, and it isn’t a grading standard. The Canadian Grain Commission malting barley determinant table prints no protein window at all, and no minimum test weight either. Protein targets vary by maltster and by the market they are selling into, so the number belongs in your contract rather than in an assumption. That the CGC doesn’t grade on protein doesn’t mean protein doesn’t matter. It matters enormously, commercially.
Feed is the fallback market for most malting-variety barley that isn’t selected, but it isn’t a guaranteed price. Your lot still has to meet the feed buyer's own specifications, it can grade Sample on light weight or another defect, and the feed market itself will have moved by the time a malt rejection happens. The Canadian Grain Commission also notes that unselected malting barley may be selected for food instead, so malt-or-feed isn’t the only fork.