Oats, past and present
By Chelsie Vandaveer
March 23, 2004
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Oats are annual grasses. Usually planted in the spring, they grow, flower, and produce seeds before dying in the autumn. Oat or oats refers to both the plants and their seeds. Oats belong to the genus Avena and, depending upon the authority, there are anywhere from "13 species and subspecies" (Technical Bulletin 1100, National Agricultural Library, USDA, 1955) to "fewer than fifty species" (Hortus Third, L.H. Bailey Hortorium, 1976). Oats are problematic; their history is obscure and the number of varieties makes determining genetic
relationships difficult.
Oats were known to the ancient civilizations; oat caryopses (seeds of grasses) found in Egyptian tombs date to the Middle Kingdom (2050 to 1800 BCE). Apparently oats were not an important cereal to the ancients, but persisted as weeds in fields of barley or wheat. Oats did not become an important food crop in Europe until the rise of Christianity. ("Origin, History, and Uses of Oat (Avena sativa) and Wheat (Triticum aestivum)", Lance Gibson and Garren Benson, Department of Agronomy, Iowa State University, 2002)
Aside from oats use as animal fodder, the grain became a base for porridge (oatmeal). The straw was used as bedding (animals and people) and retained enough nutrition that oat straw doubled as hay for cattle when winters were cold and lean.
The oat generally considered the source of rolled oats and oat flour is Avena sativa Linnaeus. Oats are a base for breakfast cereals, oat flour is in bakery items, and is a substitute grain for people suffering from wheat gluten allergies or who need to reduce their low density lipoprotein ("bad cholesterol") levels. Oats contain antioxidants, avenanthramides. The grain stores for long periods without spoiling and as a food additive, stabilizes diary products.
The hulls and waste products of oats are not wasted. The dried material is rich in pentoses, 5 carbon sugars. The sugars, hydrolyzed, are one source of furfural (furaldehyde), an oily solvent with a faint odor of almonds. Furfural is an intermediate chemical used in the refining of lubricant oils and rosins, the manufacture of shoe dyes, herbicides, fungicides, soil fumigants, and the production of nylon. ("Furfural", Westpro Company)
Den Virtuella Floran has posted an article (in Swedish) and photographs of oats taken by Arne and Anna-Lena Anderberg. To view the page, click on the link:
http://linnaeus.nrm.se/flora/mono/poa/avena/avensat.html
Click on the thumbnails to enlarge the images of oats.
Suggested Reading:
What is an animated oat? Weird Plants - April 8, 2004
Why is this ancient grain making a comeback? Plants that Changed History - September 7, 2004
What is gruel? Herbal Folklore - April 19, 2004
What is a wheat berry? Weird Plants - October 9, 2003
Who was Ceres? What's in a Name? - April 16, 2004
Why did Linnaeus name the wheats Triticum? What's in a Name? - September 14, 2001
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