Sweet Corn

[Livebait]

Trying to get two small crops in this year. Here is my early yellow batch. I had plants ripened as early as 70days from seed others needed 80days. The seed packet they came in said 75days till harvest.

I'm pretty happy with their growth seeing how i thought i had planted them way to early, way to close to do much I planted 18corn plants in a 6'X3' patch, i have gotten 16healthy plants each yeilded atleast one good sized very sweet ear! The two other plants where over powered!


Slideshow of Corn seed to harvest - Photobucket - Video and Image Hosting
Here's how they grew with four of the average sized ears shown

[Lesley Jay]

Gosh, you did plant them very close together! Those corn cobs look fabulous, so evenly coloured and sized. Bet they taste good as well.

[paul]

Hi Livebait,

What sweetcorn did you use ?

[Livebait]

Hello Paul,

The 16plants that produced succesfully were Golden Bantam seeds, the two plants that got overgrown where placed in the plot in hopes of getting a Bicolored crop, they where a white variety called Silver Queen

Thanks Lesley i was actually trying for Bicolored

I much prefer White varietys or Bicolored over the yellows but they all taste great when you get good at judging the best time to pick

[Cookie]

White sweetcorn? Never heard of it before. Does it have a better flavour than the yellow corn?

[Livebait]

Originally Posted by Cookie

White sweetcorn? Never heard of it before. Does it have a better flavour than the yellow corn?

Here's a little more info. about Silver Queen corn:

Silver Queen Hybrid Sweet Corn | Corn Seed from Gurney's Seed and Nursery

Corn, Silver Queen Hybrid (SU)

Here's a look at my Silver Queen plants



My family and i prefer the Silver Queen taste to the Golden Bantam's

[Lesley Jay]

Originally Posted by Livebait

Thanks Lesley i was actually trying for Bicolored

Livebait I have just been thinking about your bi-coloured sweetcorn. Cross pollinated sweetcorn will produce the true corn this year, which is your yellow and white corn cobs, but if you save the corn kernels and grow next years sweetcorn from the saved kernels, then the sweetcorn will not grow true and you should get yellow and white bi-coloured corn cobs. That is assuming that the sweetcorn did get cross pollinated this year.

Does that make sense?

[Livebait]

Originally Posted by Lesley Jay

Livebait I have just been thinking about your bi-coloured sweetcorn. Cross pollinated sweetcorn will produce the true corn this year, which is your yellow and white corn cobs, but if you save the corn kernels and grow next years sweetcorn from the saved kernels, then the sweetcorn will not grow true and you should get yellow and white bi-coloured corn cobs. That is assuming that the sweetcorn did get cross pollinated this year.

Does that make sense?

I understand what your saying but

This is my second try at getting Bi-colored ears useing that same method. My first try was successfull! Two seasons ago i planted 60 Golden Bantams and 20 Silver Queens we ended up harvesting 110 Bi-colored cobs.

Was that not supposed to happen

What i believe has happened differently this season is the White corn plants fell behind in growth they basically got blocked from sunlight. By the time their pollen was viable the yellow ears had already been fully self pollinated!

[Lesley Jay]

Well, I've learnt something new Livebait!! Completely different to my understanding of cross pollination in vegetables. The fact that the Silver Queen corn was so far behind is like a time delay, when you can plant an early and a late variety next to each other and know they will not get cross pollinated.

As they are planted so close together maybe try planting the varieties alternately in the rows next year to give the pollen chance to hit a different variety, as one grain of pollen on one thread of silk produces a kernel and you have had really good pollination with full corn cobs.

I'll give the close planting a try next year because I have always had part of the sweetcorn cobs unpollinated.