Based on research by John Sorenson and Robert Smith, and edited by John Welch, the December 1983 issue of the popular magazine Science 83 reported the discovery in Phoenix, Arizona, by professional archaeologists of what they supposed to be pre-Columbian domesticated barley. . . . This Arizona find is the first direct New World evidence for cultivated pre-Columbian barley in support of the Book of Mormon.
Archaeologists have been analyzing the barley samples retrieved from the Phoenix area and say that they are associated with material and strata generally dated about A.D. 900. . . . We await with interest further excavations, dating, and morphological examination to determine when and how the cultivation of this barley was begun, as well as its taxonomic relationship to New or Old World wild barleys. [John L. Sorenson, Robert F. Smith, and John W. Welch, "Barley in Ancient America," in Reexploring the Book of Mormon, F.A.R.M.S., pp. 130-132]
“Of Wheat and of Barley”
According to John Sorenson, botanists today believe that the earliest wheat in the New World was introduced by Spaniards. "I am aware of no clear-cut evidence to the contrary, although there are hints that warrant closer examination." Wheat now grows in Guatemala but only at elevations higher than our [land of] Nephi. Possibly the Nephites brought seed with them and grew wheat for a time, only to have it disappear from cultivation later on, a not uncommon phenomenon in the experience of migrating groups. But the "problem" may be one of scientific method rather than of the Book of Mormon's statements. In 1982, for example, apparent domesticated barley was reported found in Arizona, the first pre-Columbian occurrence in the western hemisphere. That such an important crop could have gone undiscovered for so long by archaeologists justifies the thought that wheat might also be found in ancient sites. Another possibility is that edible seeds not familiar to most of us were labeled with the names "wheat" or "barley." (Names do shift: "corn" in England means wheat; in Scotland, oats; in North America, maize.) Amaranth, considered an Old World grain, was grown and used in Mexico at the time the Spaniards arrived. Botanist Jonathan Sauer thought its origin to be American, but he noted too that it was widely distributed in the Old World in pre-Columbian times. Its uses in the two hemispheres were strikingly similar also (it was popped and eaten as "popcorn balls" on special feast days); the similarities have suggested to some scholars that amaranth seed was carried across the ocean in ancient times. Could the name translated in the Book of Mormon as "wheat" actually have been amaranth? [John L. Sorenson, An Ancient American Setting for the Book of Mormon, pp. 185-186]
Mosiah 9:9 We began to till the ground . . . with seeds of wheat ([Illustration]): Beautiful golden wheat, stacked and ready for the threshing floor, is harvested by hand in the mountains of Guatemala. [Scot and Maurine Proctor, Light from the Dust, p. 123]