Experimenting with wheat:
In the Prairies, the growing season can be as short as 90 days. Many crops that grew well in the east needed a longer growing season on the Prairies. Farmers began to experiment with different wheat strains to see if they could develop new varieties that were better suited to the Prairie climate. By the 1890's, the government recognized that developing suitable grain varieties was a key requirement to populating the Prairies with farms and settlers. It was ideal to the Prairies because it ripened early and could take heavy winds.