Sweet Corn Disaster

I really enjoy sweet corn; it and home-grown tomatoes are some of my favorite things to eat. If you know me, or even if you have just seen me, you know that eating is very high on my priority list. Nothing beats a good ear of sweet corn. That is why two years ago I decided to turn one of our smallest fields into my sweet corn patch. That is when this tale of tragedy started.

The field is just a little over an acre with a steep field entrance off a very busy road. It was hard to get the equipment into the field, especially the combine. Two years ago, the field was to be planted to corn as part of our normal crop rotation. That was when I hatched my sweet corn idea. Just the thought of an acre of sweet corn made my mouth water, I would have enough for myself and all my friends and neighbors.

The field was prepared just like the rest of the corn ground, except for the fact that I put down dry fertilizer myself instead of the anhydrous (remember this field was going to be sweet corn because it was too small to get equipment in). My first surprise was the sticker shock when I found out how much seed for gmo sweet corn was. Oh well, I could sell a little at the local farmer’s market to recoup my cost.

My next surprise was to find out that with the drums that we had for our air planter I could not plant the right seed population. We did the best we could, and the population was a little thick but not bad. The corn emerged and initially the project looked like it was going to be a success. Then life happened.

We decided to buy a new house. The house move did not affect the sweet corn patch, but it did affect my time. More specifically, the sweet corn was ready the week we needed to move. We had a couple of meals off the sweet corn patch and a couple of my neighbors picked a little bit of it. However, the greatest majority went to feeding the deer and racoons in the neighborhood. I contemplated sending Wildlife and Parks a bill but decided my crisis was not their problem.

Fast forward to this year. I decided that my sweet corn experiment would work if I gave the field a little more attention. I borrowed a small disc from a neighbor and worked the ground properly. Remember the whole move thing last year? Well that affected my ability to keep the patch clean and left too many dead weeds to plant into. In any case, I prepared the field and purchased the seed. Then planting season happened.

We started in on the corn and corn planting was strung out enough that we went straight into soybean planting. I had a really hard time justifying the time it would take to switch everything over to the settings I needed for my sweet corn experiment. Because of this and a couple other unforeseen scheduling conflicts I did not get to plant my sweet corn until the middle of June. Some years that might work but if you look back on the end of June and much of July you will remember it was hotter than normal and much drier.

Speaking of drier, remember how I worked the patch down so well. I was reminded of why I am such a big fan of no-till. That ground was much drier and much fluffier than our untilled ground. Remember how I had a problem with the population the year before. The seed I had this year was much lighter and smaller and I went from too many seeds per acre to not nearly enough. However, in retrospect, population was not my worst problem.

The seed sat in the ground for weeks until we had enough moisture to sprout it sometime in July. Then the one hundred plus temperatures cooked it. Finally, the rains and cool temperatures came, and the corn started growing. Then two days later it started tasseling at a grand total of three feet tall. Even then I had hope, after all the weather for pollinating and filling out ears was the best we had all summer.

That was when the wildlife found my sweet corn patch. Each night I would look at the patch and think that in a day or two I would have some sweet corn to pick. The next morning I would come back to find that plant mangled. It looks like my sweet corn experiment was even worse the second year.

It’s a good thing I am so bull headed, or I might never get to eat sweet corn. Yeah, I could buy it but that costs too much, and it is more fun to grow your own. Besides, I am being encouraged by the deer and racoons to keep trying too. A few tweaks here and there and next year will be my year, you can count on that.