Topic: Corn

[Jim]

Corn is one of my favorite vegetables.  I especially like the taste when it comes right out of the garden.  You can't begin to get that taste from anything bought at the grocery.  If you don't have the space to raise it yourself about the best you can do is get it at a farmers market.

This year my corn patch is going to be a bit larger than last year.  It's 40 X 100.  Dianna and I have some areas on the back 3 acres that are really rough because the land was bush-hogged right after a big rain.  It was the only chance we were going to have to get it done so we have been living with the ruts.  When mowing there you had to slow down or take a chance on being ejected from the tractor.  That's where my corn patch is going to be this year.  That will smooth it out!

Here's a shot right after I finished tilling the fertilizer in and it's ready to plant.



Changed back to photobucket.  Thanks for the comment Barb.

[Jim]

I got real energetic yesterday and decided to plant some corn.  I wanted to try out the new garden planter that Dianna got me for my birthday.  Well, it didn't work so good.  I tilled up a new spot this year and because of the grass clumps that are still not decomposed, they would build up on the seed shoe after pushing it about 3 feet.  Anyway, maybe I will be able to use it in the garden as it doesn't have nearly as much grass.

I planted 6 rows of Silver King.  This variety is supposed to be more tolerant of the corn smut that I had last year and also has a shorter maturity cycle (81-90 days).  And the weather man says we may get some frost this weekend.  Oh well, it probably won't have peeked through yet anyway.

Here's a pic of the end where I planted so far.  I plant the rows in the short direction because you need about 4 rows for the corn to pollinate.

[sunsoaker]

MMMmmm   Fresh corn.  Sure do miss that.  The best corn I ever had was corn the canneries wouldn't take.

Eons ago, my then hubby worked at a family friend's farm between terms in college. We had a major storm with 60 - 70 mph straight-line winds. A LOT of the corn was blown down, stalks and all. The cannery wouldn't take them since they'd been on the ground. Their loss, our gain. The ex loaded up the back of the station wagon to the brim.  We blanched and froze all we could. We did the same the next day. After we had put up all we possibly could, and kept some for fresh, I took the rest to work with me, opened the back of the wagon and let the co-workers grab what they wanted. It was, of course, gone in no time.  The next day they were all wanting me to bring more "'cause it was the best corn they'd ever had". Mind you, we grew our own corn every year (among other things). It's not that I hadn't ever had fresh corn before, but that this really was the sweetest best tasting corn I have ever eaten before or since.  There are some things I do miss about Oregon!

Good luck with the corn Jim!!!

[sunsoaker]

P.S.  Didn't like the new hosting site.  Like being able to click to enlarge, but the minute it opened, there was an audible ad running, and when I closed it, I had pop ups. 

[Jim]

Thanks for the comments on the hosting site.  I opened with Firefox and saw that the ad was blocked.  Soooo...I uploaded to Photobucket and now you get the full sized pic.  We don't need any more pop-ups.

[sunsoaker]

FYI, I do run a pop up blocker, but some (very few) sites, this one included, I have it set to allow pop-ups. I probably wouldn't have even noticed otherwise.

[Jim]

I know what you mean.  You need to allow the pop-ups for the PMs but we don't need anything else.  I had heard good things about Image Thrust but when I uploaded those pics I noticed they said if you change the link in any way it would be deleted.  That should have clued me in that they were including pop-ups that we don't want.  I imagine that's the way they pay for the service, but I can do without it if it means pop-ups.

[Patty S]

I made the mistake of clicking on one of your little pics before you changed them to PhotoBucket, & got a pop-up from fastclick. (Went into my cookies & deleted it right away, cuz those things can bog me down & I had just run my adware program.) Thanx for changing them back to PB.  I still think it's the best hosting site going, but I sure wish they'd stop fixing things that aren't broken!

It looks like you're turning into a regular farmer there, Jim! I used to raise corn when we were in Montana, but finally gave it up, cuz so many of the neighbors grew it & gave it away, come harvest time.
(Besides that, corn pulls a lot of nitrogen from the soil, & I was too tight to buy fertilizer.)
We always planted pumpkins in our corn rows though, cuz plants from the squash family put nitrogen back into the soil.

When I first moved all the strawberries into planters here, it left a big patch of dirt in the back yard.  Since it was too late in the spring to seed in a successful lawn I decided to make a corn patch out of it, just to have something there.

Things were going fine & I didn't have a bug problem, cuz I controlled the earwigs & other corn lovers with cayenne pepper ...until the cucumber beetle hit.


Those darned things came in droves & mutated every stalk till they had killed the whole corn patch! I tried every trick in the book to keep from using the bad pesticides, but when they started hitting my roses I went ballistic & put Sevin on everything that wasn't food!  (Oddly enough, they didn't bother the veggie garden at all... not even the cucumbers!) 

Watch out for this guy...

(I hear that he also comes with stripes, instead of dots, in some regions.) I can't tell you how to get rid of him if he hits you, but trust me on this... if he does, you WON'T be happy! 

I sure didn't mean to rain on your parade!   I'm hoping for the best with that beautiful corn patch you've got started, & I have everything crossed!

[Bonnie]

Wow ya'll have been working hard. It's looking good.

Ya'll plant I'll eat.

Bonnie

[Jim]

It looks like you're turning into a regular farmer there, Jim! I used to raise corn when we were in Montana, but finally gave it up, cuz so many of the neighbors grew it & gave it away, come harvest time.

Not really, but I do love my vegetable garden.  One of the reasons we love it here so much is we have enough room to do these kinds of things.  I had a house in town with a 1/3 acre lot.  After I sold it, I wanted something in the country and we found this 7.96 acre tract that had been farmland.  It had a few small pines but I cut all those.  Across the main road is a wildlife refuge so we are about as far out in the country as you can get and we love it.

Rotating the crops is good when you are growing corn and even planting a good cover crop to put the nutrients back into the soil.  We didn't have a problem with bugs, just the heat caused the fungus(smut) and there is no spray for that.

You didn't rain on my parade, besides I got a raincoat!       

[MassMama]

WOW what a Great area    I wish I had a larger area than I do.. But I will make due.. 

Jim wanna come up and till my garden for me ?

[Jim]

I have to do something to keep from having to mow so much grass.  It takes a good 7.5 hours on the tractor with a 4 ft mower.  I'm hoping the seat time will be cut a bit after Dianna gets to where she can ride the lawn tractor.  It's a 48 inch cut so should about cut the time in half if both of us are out there.  We like the smooth look that the little John Deere leaves versus the bush hog on the tractor.

The tiller on the tractor will tear up some property.  Most of the spots I have been over twice and it turns to powder.  I've got Aunt Bonnie's small tiller here too but it beats me to death.

If I had my tractor and tiller I would be glad to till your garden, Rita.  But if I have to use one of those you have to try and hold, not a chance.  Those about rip my arms out of the sockets!

[MassMama]

  thats some serious tractor time!! I wish I had a bigger Yard but not quite that big

I have never used a hand tiller... All I have is a Garden Claw.. Its going to take me forever to turn the new Veggie area.. But it will be worth it in the long run..    I am just hoping this blasted snow melts so I can get out there and start working on it!!

[Bonnie]

I thought your arms were getting longer, Jim, and that's your tiller. My arms are long enough.

Bonnie

This is a corny subject

[Dianna]

Jim took a picture on my camera today of his corn patch, so I guess it is up to me to post an update...



Doesn't look like the 27 degree weather we had last week-end hurt it much!

[Jim]

I was tickled to see my corn peeking through.  It appears that it was deep enough that the frost last weekend didn't affect it.  I have 6 rows and had some plants coming up in every row.  There were even some in between the rows because I was dropping the seed and obviously dropped some other than where they were supposed to be.

This weekend we are supposed to have a 38 degree morning.  That is OK.

[Patty S]

Wow!  That's looking pretty darned good!

Ummm... Who's gets to do all the weeding out there?  

[Dianna]

Jim will be doing the weeding. I get to "put up" all the corn he ends up picking out there...

[Jim]

First 6 rows are about 8" high now.  I planted 9 more rows of Golden Queen tonight.  That make them about a month apart.  I'll wait another 15 days or so and plant the rest in Silver Queen.  We should have fresh corn from July through September like this.

I'll try to get some photos tomorrow.

[Jim]

Got one shot of the corn.  I need to get in here with the tiller also before the weeds get ahead of me.  So far the rows planted on 2 May have not started breaking through.  I need to side dress the first 6 rows now with a little 10-10-10 before I till down the middle. 

[Bonnie]

It's really looking good, Jim.

Bonnie

[Penny]

   Looks great and i agree with you Jim.......nothing like fresh corn!!

Enjoy you guys!!

[Jim]

Looks like my corn may not do so good this year.  I thought last year was bad but it has been worse this year so far.  My first planting (1 April) is only about knee high and starting to tassel.  I got a terrible planting rate on the second planting and the 3rd isn't up at all.  I don't know if it's just too hot or what.  Maybe the seed was bad.

I'll update the photos when it gets dry.

[Pharmerphil]

what type of soil you have there Jim?
It may be your seed, but atthis time, I don't have any prime available, nor does my business partner.
or it would be yours for the asking

[Jim]

It's mostly clay.  I broadcast 10-10-10 then tilled it in, side dressed with the same after it was about 12" high.  I didn't get a soil sample analyzed but that was about all I did last year. 

I'm thinking I may have tilled it too deep.  It's about like powder.  The tiller on the tractor really does the job.  Now to get the hand tiller through it, I have to push it.  That plus no rain may have done it.  I have the hose run out there now so I can water.  Maybe I should replant and see what happens.