My Sweet Corn Reviews

[Car Doc]

I picked a dozen ears of my GottaHaveIt last week, and it was not as good as I have had other years because it wasn't mature enough. I remembered afterwards that the best and sweetest was picked when the ears looked like they would be tough. So now I have to wait a little longer. It seems like this variety never really gets tough or over ripe.

Yup thats what I figured out also its very tasty and the sweetest corn we ever ate hands down! I would just wait on it until the silks are totally brown and about to fall off. I agree there is a lot wider window of opportunity than with other variety's I have tried this one is very forgiving time wise.

Then start pealing a few of the more mature ones down and do the thumbnail test it seemed to take mine up to a week and maybe even a little longer after the clear liquid stage to get a full kernel and still be milky.

The very best ones we harvested had a full rounded kernel but once they get their color they were still real good to eat but waiting awhile after that is the best I found.

We have had 35 days over 100 this summer and that couldn't have been good although I put 2"-3" of h2o every day on mine.

I am experimenting on a late season planting of GottaHaveIt after I had my garden all tilled my wife asked me if I could plant more corn since we didn't have much left over for us we gave so much away it was so good everybody raved about it! I put in 450' this year and next year will be more!

Well what the heck its worth a try I said with the summer we had so far. I put another 288' in Aug 2 and it was up 1 1/2" in 4 days and its got 3-4 leaves now and is 4-5" tall I am sure hoping it works that gives me until the first week of Nov w/o a freeze and I think I have a good chance to make it. :thumbsup:

btw anyone that says this corn doesn't germinate well isn't doing something right is what I say about that.

 

[charlz]

Yeah I have found the same thing in years past, it is best to wait just a little longer than you would think. Even then I have found I can pick over a good 2 week period before it even starts to think about getting 'too far along'. After a while you get a feel for what the cobs should feel like in your hand before you pick them.

Still waiting to have corn this year, mine is just starting to silk :drool:

 

[Car Doc]

hey charlz since yours is just starting to silk I will throw this out.

I dont know what you do for bugs but I found out just this year that liquid sevin sprayed right on the tops of the ears just as they silk and powdered sevin a week later and I may have done the dry once more later dont remember but that got rid of 95% of my worms.

My corn for once was just as clean and bug free as the store bought corn ymmv as always but it sure worked good for me this year! hth good luck on your crop :thumbsup:

One more thing I wasn't too wild about my crop was only 1 good ear per stalk until it was explained to me by a farm TV show so dont know what you have found but thats my experience so for with all the sweet corn I have planted at least this one is the most extreme example of it though of only 1 good ear I have occasionally gotten 2 on Kandy Korn.

I had a lot of doubles and really planted A LOT of corn because I used the corn plate instead of the pea plate which I did last week with every other hole taped over and this seed is so small its hard to regulate it anyway but that seemed to work good.

The farm TV seed dealers were talking about field corn which is supposed to make multiple ears or least thats what my experience from being on a farm was anyway they said the current planting strategy for best production was seeding close together and forcing the plants to make one good ear and this was giving the highest yields?! Cant argue with success so I am good with that its pretty easy to over plant this small seed anyway so go with it I suppose.

 

[charlz]

hey charlz since yours is just starting to silk I will throw this out.

I dont know what you do for bugs but I found out just this year that liquid sevin sprayed right on the tops of the ears just as they silk and powdered sevin a week later and I may have done the dry once more later dont remember but that got rid of 95% of my worms.

My corn for once was just as clean and bug free as the store bought corn ymmv as always but it sure worked good for me this year! hth good luck on your crop :thumbsup:

One more thing I wasn't too wild about my crop was only 1 good ear per stalk until it was explained to me by a farm TV show so dont know what you have found but thats my experience so for with all the sweet corn I have planted at least this one is the most extreme example of it though of only 1 good ear I have occasionally gotten 2 on Kandy Korn.

I had a lot of doubles and really planted A LOT of corn because I used the corn plate instead of the pea plate which I did last week with every other hole taped over and this seed is so small its hard to regulate it anyway but that seemed to work good.

The farm TV seed dealers were talking about field corn which is supposed to make multiple ears or least thats what my experience from being on a farm was anyway they said the current planting strategy for best production was seeding close together and forcing the plants to make one good ear and this was giving the highest yields?! Cant argue with success so I am good with that its pretty easy to over plant this small seed anyway so go with it I suppose.

Usually my first planting would be ready before the corn ear worms got bad. Later plantings would get hit hard. I tried BT for a few years and that seemed to help some. This year since my planting is late I was thinking of trying the mineral oil trick. We like to just cut the tip off the ears/cobs and soak them husk and all for BBQing so I am reluctant to use pesticide right on the ears.

I have had good luck getting two good ears per plant on about half or a little more of the plants. Things aren't looking too good this year. Don't know if it was just the poor weather, soil conditions or that I have the white versus bi-color or all three.

 

[Ford850]

What a difference a week makes! I picked several follow up batches of GottaHaveIt after letting it mature a little longer, and it was as sweet and flavorful as we remembered from previous years.
I've had very little worm damage this year and don't use anything to prevent it. I get maybe one worm per dozen and even that one will have little or no kernel damage.

 

[ray66v]

I've had very little worm damage this year and don't use anything to prevent it.

I tried that strategy for a while. You can get an occasional off year because of the weather, but I found ignoring the worms, along with any other problem in the garden, will in the end, generally lead to more of it in the future.

 

[Car Doc]

Things aren't looking too good this year. Don't know if it was just the poor weather, soil conditions or that I have the white versus bi-color or all three.

It was brutal is all I can say in every extreme wet-cold to hot-dry we actually had good corn weather as gardeners in my area. We could control the h20 and the sun just came at us like a freight train day after day and still is and corn likes that as long as there is h20.

I cant comment on the white vs bi-color I wouldn't think thats it but the seed may have been bad I imagine that could happen or the temps?

My late season experimental planting is up to 12" at 3 weeks and 3 days and they have 5-6 leaves and stalks are 1/4 to 3/8" dia its growing 1-2" a day average looks like. I have high hopes but nature probably will slap us with an early winter after the summer we had be our luck.

 

[charlz]

I figure I have another 2 weeks to wait. Since it was discussed here I did notice that probably 98% of the stalks only have one ear. Again don't know if it is due to conditions or the white versus bi-color. Next year I will plant both and see how they compare.

 

[Car Doc]

What a difference a week makes! I picked several follow up batches of GottaHaveIt after letting it mature a little longer, and it was as sweet and flavorful as we remembered from previous years.
I've had very little worm damage this year and don't use anything to prevent it. I get maybe one worm per dozen and even that one will have little or no kernel damage.

I agree a week can make all the difference it is very forgiving it took me a bit to be able to leave some ears on I thought were close but it pays off.

Glad it worked not doing anything it never has failed for me to have bugs even when I used sevin this year a lot I still had a few get in. as always ymmv :thumbsup:

 

[tn2429]

I have a question about using the earthway with a plate for side dressing . i have the attachment for fertalizer but it is gravity fed so keeping a consistant speed is very important and if you get hung up on something it leaves a pile so i am very interested in the method and plate you use and do you go down both sides of the row? how far out ? Maybe i wont have to do a bunch of testing do you know how much it applys on a 100 ft row with the pea plate ??? Thanks for any help