Corn Thread for 2014

@Jared77 I can't wait for your Glass Gem harvest! You will have to post pics, that corn is so pretty!

The verdict is in on the Peaches N' Cream corn. Failure. Lousy pollination and what corn kernels that did make provided a tasty treat for the worms. But at least the chickens loved me. I peeled the shucks back so they could get to the worms and corn and tossed it in their run. I didn't even get a good corn development on a lot of the stalks. Racking my tiny little brain (which took all of a nano second) I realized that I might not get enough direct hours of sunlight on the backyard garden patch. Shade. I get overhead sun and afternoon sun, maybe it was a factor also. The tomatoes are growing great though. So at least I'll get something out of that patch for my efforts.

So, major rain over a period of weeks when the all important pollination was occurring, possibly not enough sunshine and icky worms........sends me to the grocery store to buy sweet corn and put in the freezer like I have done for the past few years.

The Anasazi sweet corn is planted in the front yard where I had good luck last year with Daymon Morgan's Kentucky Butcher corn. The Painted Mountain is planted in a sunny spot and the Oaxacan Green dent corn is planted in the back yard where I hope it gets enough sunshine......we'll see.

I need some advice on fertilizing my sweet corn. I have some ambrosia that is about 4" tall. Wha duo I want to use to fertilize?

Last year I used chicken compost in the soil before I planted, then top dressed with bone meal a couple of times. This year I am doing the same thing.

Would side dressing with 12-12-12 or a 12-0-12 be appropriate?

Whitney Farms makes a balanced fertilizer for the vegetable garden.

I like to get dry, organic fertilizers on early and get it covered with soil. It takes some time for the soil organisms to break it down to something the plants can use.

Bagged composted chicken manure 3-2-2, is available around here. It's good stuff and works well with sweet corn.

Steve

OhiyaFarminDadof6 said:

Would side dressing with 12-12-12 or a 12-0-12 be appropriate?

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Should be fine. Keep it 4" away.

I have had a little better luck with my Anasazi sweet corn. I picked 3 ears today and they were decent looking ears of corn. Pollination was good, no worms, somehow I did something right! We ate them tonight for supper and my husband raved about it. We found our plant-it-again-corn! I will let the rest of the corn dry and go to seed so I can plant a bigger patch next year. I would recommend this variety!

M-m-m-m-m-m-m-m-m! Hot, sweet, and buttery heaven.

This is my Breeder's Choice, a hybrid SE I get from Burpee. I planted it at four different times this year, about 10 to 15 days apart each planting, which is normal for me. That way I get one good canning at a time plus have fresh corn to eat of off for a couple of months. You can't see it real well but the stuff on the top left is in full silk, won't be long for it. The top right is just starting to tassel, saw my first tassel this morning. I'm trying something different this year, two rows 12" apart, then skip about 34" then two more at 12". Fertilize a little heavy and see what happens. I hand pollinate but I'm not sure how important that is this year.

If you look closely you can see some Waltham butternut squash just coming up in the inside rows. If the squash bugs leave me alone, I should have a good green mulch in there pretty soon.

Your cornfield looks great! I think staggering the planting is smart!