View From The Cab

By David Tollefson, Columnist

I’m sure many of you out there, like me, love wild rice soup. Until recently, I thought most of it came from Native Americans up in Northern Minnesota, collecting the kernels from the tall stalks of rice in shallow lakes or sloughs.

In this fall’s edition of Land and Life, published by the Minnesota Farm Bureau Federation, of which I am a long-time member, is an interesting article about two familys’ experience in that industry. It is written by Amy Overgaard Fenske. Here it is, edited for length:

During World War II, Minneapolis native James Godward served with the Army Air Corps in Burma and India. While stationed there, he observed the white rice paddies in those countries, and their unique growing methods. It reminded him of the Native American tradition of wild rice on the lakes of northern Minnesota, which he had been exposed to throughout his life when at the Godward family cabin in Crosslake, Minnesota. And it got him thinking: could you cultivate wild rice and grow it in a similar manner?

“He got back from WWII and didn’t really know what he wanted to do, and he also had a very entrepreneurial spirit,” says James’ grandson, Nick Godward.  “He had a lot of different businesses or ideas, and he and his brother {Gerald} kind of stuck on wild rice.”

THE START OF A NEW INDUSTRY

The two brothers began researching how they could cultivate wild rice, spending several years in the “test phase” of their hopeful endeavor. They spent time in Texas, learning white rice growing techniques. 

Back in Minnesota, their father bought some farmland near their Crosslake cabin, where they began implementing what they had learned. The duo experimented first with cultivating wild rice in the lake on their family land, then turned to fields, adding dikes around the perimeter—which they had dug by hand so they could be flooded to provide an optimal growth environment for the plant. “It was very unorthodox,” Nick says. “It was trial by fire.”

They launched Godward Wild Rice Farms in 1950, and today it’s run by James’ son, Tom, and his two sons, Brandon and Nick. “We are the very first wild rice farm in the world,” Nick says. Today, the three of them farm on the original land in Crosslake, as well as in Aitkin and Palisade, Minnesota.

It was another pair of brothers from northern Minnesota, Harold and Franklin Kosbau, who were the first wild rice farmers to successfully raise a non-shattering cultivar of wild rice, in the early 1970’s. (Shattering is when kernels fall off the plant prematurely due to wind, rain and other natural elements.) With non-shattering cultivars, fewer kernels are lost during the growing season and more can make it to maturity and be harvested.

The Kosbau brothers, like the Godwards, did a lot for the growth of the industry in Minnesota. They were the first wild rice farmers to develop and use a full-track combine for harvesting, and they also introduced airboats as a harvesting and thinning tool. Their cultivation efforts resulted in two varieties named after the family—a variety called K2, released in 1972, and “Franklin,” released in the late 1990s. They also helped start the Minnesota Cultivated Wild Rice Council and petitioned the government to name wild rice as the state grain.

Harold’s grandson, Nathan Kosbau, carries on the family legacy today, farming 600 acres of wild rice and soybeans just north of Aitkin, Minnesota—nearby the Godward’s farm.

The Godwards and Nathan are two of only 30 cultivated wild rice farms across the state; California is the only other state in the nation that grows cultivated wild rice. The Red Lake Nation—the only native-run cultivated wild rice farm in Minnesota—is the state’s fifth largest producer. 

Globally, Minnesota is the top producer of cultivated wild rice, with over 10 million pounds of wild rice produced in 2023.

“The Minnesota cultivated wild rice industry contributes over $58 million and 640 jobs to the state’s economy,” says Beth Nelson, president of the Minnesota Cultivated Wild Rice Council. “Cultivated wild rice farming is a family affair—83% of our farms have multiple generations involved in ownership or operation of the farm and are now transitioning to the next generation.”

FROM SEED TO SOUP

Growing and Harvesting

*Cultivated wild rice fields must be flooded to mimic lake conditions, then slowly drained as the crop grows.

*Once seeds are planted in early spring, fields are flooded to depths ranging from 6 inches to 2 feet. A dike around the field helps contain the water, with water-gate structures offering surface irrigation and helping to manage water levels.

*By mid-to-late June, as the wild rice grows and the shoots surface above the water, the fields are slowly drained—generally about ½ to 1 inch per week.

*By early August, fields are generally fully drained, and when the majority of kernels reach maturity, harvest generally begins—usually lasting two weeks, beginning in late August.

*Since kernels have a high moisture content and do not ripen evenly, only about 50% of the grain that’s harvested will become finished wild rice.

*Combines used to harvest cultivated wild rice are retrofitted with full tracks, three-quarter tracks, half-tracks or rice and cane tires (depending on the field’s soil) along with customizing thrashing rotors and headers.

PROCESSING

There are about 7 different steps in processing, including curing, screening, steaming, drying, hulling, grading and cleaning.

Found throughout the Great Lakes region in the United States and Canada, wild rice is the only cereal grain native to North America. 

It’s a nutritional powerhouse: this whole grain is naturally gluten-free and is a good source of complex carbohydrates, B vitamins, magnesium, manganese, phosphorus and zinc. Containing more protein than both white and brown rice, it can help you stay full longer.  It also contains all nine essential amino acids.

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Please contact David Tollefson with thoughts or comments on this or future columns at: adtollef@hcinet.net