corn, X-rated question
Karen Kolling
I planted corn for the first time this year, figuring I'd have to
hand pollinate it. Now the little incipient ears are growing, and
I don't know what has to be put where. help.
Darryl Rees
writes
> I planted corn for the first time this year, figuring I'd have to
> hand pollinate it. Now the little incipient ears are growing, and
> I don't know what has to be put where. help.
All will become obvious. Soon the little tassles (female bits), will start to
pop out of the ears, and the male `flowers' will start to sprout at the top.
When the pollen starts falling from the male flowers with just the slightest
tap, you should try and get as much of the pollen on the tassels as possible.
(You could cut the male flowers off and shake them around just above the tassels,
I haven't tried - but they seem to continue to produce pollen for a few days).
If it rains for a couple of days just as pollination is about to start, it
could be _bad_ news.
Good Luck
Darryl Rees (D.R...@qut.edu.au)
Queensland University of Technology
Brisbane, Australia
CATfish
When the silks of your ears appear, the top of the corn plant
should contain the pollen. Using a paper bag or rolled news paper
to catch the pollen, bend the top over and shake. If you don't
see yellow dust, then the pollen isn't "ripe" yet, or its already
blown away. Pour the pollen on the silks of the ears.
Did you plant a single row, or a block of corn? If its in a row,
you'll need to hand pollenate. If its in a block, then you
probably won't. I grew a small block 5' x 8' (containing 3 rows)
last year with great success.
-David Robinson
tha...@rhea.arc.ab.ca
You don't hand pollinate corn. The spike that sticks up at top has
the pollen, the tassels that come out of the ear are the pistils.
Corn is wind pollinated, that's why it should be planted in a block
pattern; a single row will give VERY poor pollination so you get lots
of missing kernels. I find that 3 side-by-side rows is the minimum
for good pollination.
As an aside, the pollen is very mobile in the wind so some pollination
will occur up to 20 rows away or so. This means that if you are
growing white corn that flowers at the time as your yellow corn,
it's all going to come out various degrees of bicolour within
20 rows of the white variety.
Bruce A. Moon
> In article <1993Jun2.0...@adobe.com>, kkol...@adobe.com (Karen Kolling) writes:
> >
> > I planted corn for the first time this year, figuring I'd have to
> > hand pollinate it. Now the little incipient ears are growing, and
> > I don't know what has to be put where. help.
>
> You don't hand pollinate corn. The spike that sticks up at top has
> the pollen, the tassels that come out of the ear are the pistils.
> Corn is wind pollinated, that's why it should be planted in a block
> pattern; a single row will give VERY poor pollination so you get lots
> of missing kernels. I find that 3 side-by-side rows is the minimum
> for good pollination.
pollen is ready asnd hit the silks. This increases the kernels on the
ears. Even when planting in a block, the plants on the edges will
sometimes not be pollinated, as I am sure you are aware of.>
Sharon Badian
Ooh, corn sex! I think a picture is worth a thousand words here:
_|_ <- tassel at top of stalk
__|__
| *
| // <- an ear of corn, * is silk
|//
|
|
The pollen is on the tassel. You have to get the pollen from the
tassel to the silk. Not much of a problem in a large field of
corn. There is enough pollen floating around to fertilize the
corn. In a small plot, a little human intervention can help
in getting larger ears of corn. I think a paint brush would
do the trick. Brush against tassel, brush against silk.
Repeat on all ears. Probably should do it over a few days.
Sharon Badian
se...@dr.att.com
kl...@iscsvax.uni.edu
> In article <1993Jun2.0...@adobe.com>, kkol...@adobe.com (Karen Kolling)
> writes
>
>> I planted corn for the first time this year, figuring I'd have to
>> hand pollinate it. Now the little incipient ears are growing, and
>> I don't know what has to be put where. help.
>
> All will become obvious. Soon the little tassles (female bits), will start to
silks: these are the style and
stigma of the female flowers. The
kernal is the ovary.
> pop out of the ears, and the male `flowers' will start to sprout at the top.
Male flowers will mature over a period of several days, so pollen is
continually available in the tassel during that time. But only a few flowers
are producing pollen at any one time.
If you want to avoid hand pollination, plant corn in a block, with the
long axis of the block in the direction of the prevailing wind. You
may want to hand pollinate the plants on the upwind side, if yield is
very important to you.
Corn pollen (like that of other wind pollinated plants) blows a fair
distance from the source (though hedges and such can intercept a fair
amount of pollen). If you want to make sure you're getting pollen
from the same cultivar in an area where lots of corn cvs are growing (like
here in Iowa), you may want to put a brown paper bag over the young
wars just before the silks start to grow, then hand-pollinate the silks,
replacing the bag after pollination for a day or so. Don't use a
plastic bag, or do a really good job attaching the paper bag over the
ear-- heat built up inside the bag can kill the female flowers. The
trick is to keep pollen from blowing onto the silks while allowing some
ventilation.
Male flowers in corn may not produce much pollen if they are subjected
to a really hot spell or a really dry spell about a week or 10 days before
the pollen should be released... so if yield is important, and you
can water, try not to let the soil around corn get bone dry in this
period.
Corn's cousin, sorghum, is a better field crop than corn in areas where
rainfall is undependable, and soil moisture reserves are minimal. Unlike
corn, sorghum flowers have the ability to stop developing in time of
drought, and resume when they get a bit more water.
Kay Klier Biology Dept UNI
[who has been moving into a new (to her) 1909 house with NO garden :-(
but making friends with an elderly woman 3 houses down who needs a hand
with her BIG garden 8-)]
[and who has also been trying to do orchid field work at the same time
and getting NO sleep.... ;-) ]
Merri L Naka
->Ooh, corn sex! I think a picture is worth a thousand words here:
[...]
Great picture, Sharon! Thanks for posting!
->The pollen is on the tassel. You have to get the pollen from the
->tassel to the silk. Not much of a problem in a large field of
->corn. There is enough pollen floating around to fertilize the
->corn. In a small plot, a little human intervention can help
->in getting larger ears of corn. I think a paint brush would
->do the trick. Brush against tassel, brush against silk.
->Repeat on all ears. Probably should do it over a few days.
Or, if you'd rather be a barbarian, just use your hand. I would grab
the tassle and pull lightly on it. Then I would rub the silk. I only
had a 3 x 4' plot of corn and I was amazed at how well the ears
germinated. Oh, and I also did the ol' shake the entire stalk
routine, but I wasn't convinced that it would work and resorted to my
barbarian technique.
Merri
--
Merri Naka
mn...@ics.uci.edu
University of California, Irvine (So. California, in case you're wondering)
Jim Carr
>
> ... If you want to make sure you're getting pollen
>from the same cultivar in an area where lots of corn cvs are growing (like
>here in Iowa), you may want to put a brown paper bag over the young
>wars just before the silks start to grow, then hand-pollinate the silks,
>replacing the bag after pollination for a day or so.
Alright! All this talk about corn sex and someone finally mentions
the use of corn condoms.
There is a huge research field on the campus of Michigan State U that is
easily seen from a main road. I always got a kick out of mentioning to
grad students on campus for their first summer that they had just put
the condoms on the corn. They would think I was joking until they
drove by the field and took a look.
--
J. A. Carr <j...@scri.fsu.edu> | "The New Frontier of which I
Florida State University B-186 | speak is not a set of promises
Supercomputer Computations Research Institute | -- it is a set of challenges."
Tallahassee, FL 32306-4052 | John F. Kennedy (15 July 60)