rubbish sweetcorn

Possibly the worst sweetcorn ever ?



Does anyone know; is this just poor pollination? None of the others seem to have suffered.
It was on the edge of a block planting.
Also, I've only got one cob per plant - big sister(1) seems to have 4 or 5 !
Is this down to variety or am I missing something?

 

Yup, that looks like poor pollination to me. If the kernels had been eaten by a rodent, you'd be able to see the teeth marks. You usually get a couple of cobs with imperfect pollination out of a whole crop. But only to get one cob per plant, that's not good. Which variety did you plant? Did your plants have plenty of light and fertiliser?

 

I have done very well with my sweetcorn some of them 3 or 4 cobs on a plant. i find the sweetcorn are very greedy for manure.

 

Hmm. I planted in a corner, as the book says keep out of the wind. SE facing, but I had french beans maybe 3ft away so that would block some light too. Would lack of light effect the number of cobs?
Reasonably well fertilized I think, applied a general granular organic fertilizer before planting and (ahem, irregular) applications of a liquid, maybe every 3 weeks, during growing.
Doesn't sound that great now I come to type it out! Especially the light - really only unobstructed on one side! Poor plants...
Variety is F1 Earlibird.

 

Yes, that's been my experience too. If you think how big and strong a sweetcorn plant has to be in a relatively short growing season, you can see why they need lots of grub.

 

OK. Thanks for that. I'll definitely give it another go next season - fresh sweetcorn is utterly fantastic so it's worth persisting. I'll pick a more open plot and dig in some muck, see how that goes.

 

Sweetcorn plants grow best in good sunlight with their feet in well fed soil. They also need to be kept growing fast with plenty of water during dry spells. Nearby French beans wouldn't cause them a problem because your sweetcorn plants should have quickly outstripped them. If they're going well, you can almost see them getting bigger each day! General good health leads to beefy, vigorous plants which in turn, can produce 3 - 4 cobs each on the best ones. You'd expect the best plants to be 2 metres high at least.

I've never grown Earlibird but as an F1, it should have done better for you. I'd tried again next year with a different variety. I used to grow Kelvedon Glory F1 which I think is still available. It was very reliable but other forum members may have more recent recommendations.