Late corn planting for a last minute harvest?

I've got a grain corn patch that I planted in early May that is tasseling already at 3-4 feet tall. I'm going to be clearing out the weeds tomorrow in hopes of reducing water competition & to not block pollination when/if silks show up. I have quite a lot of space to work with within the rows due to poor germination. I blame my planting method because I know I had good seed. (I tried a method I'd seen in a video using a planting stick to waller out a hole in the mud so that I could spend less time hoeing the rows, & just put the seed where I wanted it.)

I know I could use a short 65 day sweet corn to fill the gaps & still get a harvest, but I've decided to take a gamble & go with some Painted Mountain flour corn that I received in a trade instead. I'm actually soaking the seed now to give it a head start. According to my cursory internet research, I should have just enough days before my average first frost to get it done. I'm counting on our high heat days to speed up the maturity, & can dry the ears indoors if I must. Painted Mountain is supposed to be a cold tolerant, fast maturing corn, so we'll see how it handles 90+ degree days for germination.

Anyone else out there try Painted Mountain before? What was your experience?

How many days is the painted mountain? 90 days should be Okay where you are.

Hey Thom, most sites put it around 90 DTM, with some going as low a 70-80 & some up to 110. I was hoping to fill the holes weeks ago, but life happened. It's a bit of a gamble, but the math seems to work out so long as the weather cooperates. I've never grown Painted Mountain before, so here's hoping for a decent harvest. There are so many colors & patterns in it, it should be great fun to see what comes out of it. Interesting story on how it was created too.

I grow Painted Mountain every year, and it's a good performer in our conditions. I tend to sow on the late side, usually in November but more than once that got pushed into early December because birds devoured the first (and second) plantings. 90 DTM seems about right according to my experience, but if you have warmer temps that might speed it along a bit. The hottest we ever see here is about 30 degrees and that is usually only one or two days in late January.

Hey Phil, thanks for the info.  I'm curious, do you get a lot of variability in cob size/length? Do you save your own seed year after year?

The cobs tend to be on the medium to small side of things (it's an 8-row corn, after all) but in good years I get lots of longer ones. I do save seed and this is a bit of a landrace project, headed into its tenth year if I recall. I was given a few cobs by one of my PDC students, and I think he had been growing it out for a number of years as well.

I'm also in zone 6 next door to you in Indiana. I would guess first that the tasseling at just three feet or so is probably not caused by the video inspired planting method, although it does not sound like a good method to me. Overall stress and the recent spell of very hot days are more likely the issue. My own corn is doing the same thing but is a bit taller than that and I think it is more weather related.

On replanting now, I think you have plenty of time for most corns to mature but expect you might see the same issue with it. If July and August stay hot, as they probably will corn will get its necessary heat units quickly, leading to premature flowering, possibly even more so than what you are seeing now. Temperatures much over 85 F can stunt growth and induce flowering.

Painted Mountain is not at all happy in our climate. I've seen it tassel at just a foot tall and make stunted little ears. If planted very early where it can grow longer before flowering, it tends to make very long ears, but they tend to overshoot the husks as much as five or six inches. Six inches of uncovered cob sticking out is very inviting to birds and bugs, plus PM is very prone to mold in a hot humid area. All of the western flour corns that I have tried have the same issues. Southeastern corns like Cherokee white flour handle our climate much better but they are very long season of 120 days or even longer for a nice dry down period.

Very short season sweet corns that I have tried performed even more poorly than the flour corns, with the exception of Blue Jade. It is just naturally a small plant with small ears but if planted early it is wonderful. I would not plant it now though.

I've found that many flint corns do much better. I think a lot of them and sweet corn as well originated more in the northeast and adapt better to our area. Popcorn also does better, but it is longer season and should have already been planted. You might get by with it though as the heat units play a huge role in maturity and cold weather later, other than a hard freeze does not hurt anything during the dry down period.

My corn is a mx up of pretty much everything that I have been selecting for a long time for flint. The hard kernels are much more tolerant of the humidity and bugs. I'm sure I will forget but if you are interested and want to remind me at the end of season, I might be able to supply you with some seed.

Thanks Mark for the localized report, it's helpful to know what to expect. I agree that the short plants tasseling already is most likely due to heat stress, not the planting method. I think when I planted in the spring mud, the seed holes I poked in the mud with a stick probably either compacted too much or held standing water, which ended up rotting the seed more than likely. Out of the 71 seeds planted, I think I'm down to 20 that are vigorous & strong despite them tasseling early & a bit short. My only question with them is if I'll get silks before pollen runs out.

As for the PM, I received it in a trade. There are about 80 seeds, but only about 60 are decent enough seeds. They look to be a lot of smaller ones from near the tip, but lots of colors and patterns, so we'll see. I'm going to plant them in hopes of getting better seed, if nothing else. If they don't turn out, no big loss.

I've been looking for Cherokee White Flour corn for awhile, but haven't found it yet.

Any of that the seeds I sent you?

Yes, I planted all of it. I was out there today, & I have a few 6 foot stalks, but most are 3-4 feet. I think the new planting method I tried was the culprit. I did notice the beginning of silk sheaths forming on the best, so that's a good sign that maybe I'll get the hardiest seed to continue. I'm headed back out in a bit, I'll try to get photos.

Edit: photos added. You can see how dry it's been by the leaves & hard dirt. I've manually watered from a watering can maybe 4 times all season when it's been very dry. I planted the pre-soaked Painted Mountain in the gaps today, so we'll see what happens with that.

Super dry here too. Raining a bit today, hoping for a LOT more. Yours doesn't look too bad.

That commercial corn in the background was planted a good month after mine. It sure shot up quick & shrugged off the lack of water.  Rabbits moved in overnight & started eating my sweet potato leaves & beans. Might have to break down & get some chicken wire. It's interesting to me how in a stand of corn, you can have standouts that simply out perform the rest from day one. Healthy looking, vigorous, all the same soil, same sun, same weed pressure, no other inputs. I'll definitely be saving seed from those. Hopefully, I'll get a good harvest, because I can't wait to open up those husks & see what I get. Most of the plants have the deep dark purple stalks with green leaves, but there are a few all green with no hint of purple yet.

Mixed genetics. Most have some red/pink/purple color but a strong minority will be all green. I added some glass gem in the last few years and that is all green.

Well, things are looking good afterall. I have a handful of stalks with silks to catch the pollen & we had close to 5" of rain!  The first few sprouts of the Painted Mountain corn are popping up.

Cy Cobb wrote:Well, things are looking good afterall. I have a handful of stalks with silks to catch the pollen & we had close to 5" of rain!  The first few sprouts of the Painted Mountain corn are popping up.

Painted Mountain is a flour corn?
If you have some luck I may ask for a few seeds!

Absolutely!  We'll see how things look at the end of the season, but I'd happily send some your way.

A little update here: I think I'm seeing what Mark Reed was talking about with the PM flour corn.  Low germination due to too much rain rotting the seed I think. I replanted again with some special ordered PM select seed (Lavendar Clay & Montana Cudu), both from Painted Mountain origins. Better germination this time, & enough to make a go of it.

On another note: Take a look at this plant with both tassles & silks emerging from the cob. Time to cull this one I think.

2nd planting update on the Painted Mountain corn:  Between the rabbits nibbling every leaf to the stem & the sweet potato vines really hitting their stride (crowding out the seedlings), it seems to be a long shot to see a harvest from this batch.  Of course, time will tell...

Cy Cobb wrote:2nd planting update on the Painted Mountain corn:  Between the rabbits nibbling every leaf to the stem & the sweet potato vines really hitting their stride (crowning out the seedlings), it seems to be a long shot to see a harvest from this batch.  Of course, time will tell...

It's always something! My only solution is to plant lots of seeds. Some years they all grow and I have to thin, some years it's all that gives me any crop at all.

I heard that one can plant corn and then harvest it for the corn sprouts. I actually planted some corn like two weeks ago (it's a locally-developed version of nothstine dent) with the expectation that I'd be able to collect the sprouts for a bit of nutritional value.

Even if the PM doesn't make it to maturity, would you consider harvesting a few when they're young? Even a subset of what's been planted? Just to see how they are, maybe.

Stephen,

At the moment, I don't have a single sprout that hasn't been defoliated by rabbits, & honestly, I'm more interested in expanding my limited seed stock if any survive.  

I did have a first for me, an all white seedling with zero chlorophyll from one of my PM corn. There's a name for that, but as you can imagine, it only lasted until the seed energy ran out.

I think if someone were to want to try eating corn sprouts cheaply, I'd start with a simple DIY indoor sprout/microgreen set up to cleanly sprout hundreds at a time. I'd test it on a bag of popcorn from the grocery store. Give it a try, let us know.

I am growing a dark purple corn from bakercreek and it's the earliest variety. There is misleading information on their website, citing morado maize from Peru but actually this mountain morado maize aka montana morado corn is of painted mountain origin, developed by the same people.

Of the several time I tried, this variety is very short, from 3-4ft to 5-6ft, with ears only inches off the ground and is very fast to mature. I planted at least three batches this year and as of 8/16

Seeds planted on 6/1 have died back and the dried kernels were harvested. (70 days total)
Seeds planted on 7/3 are at blister stage
Seeds planted on 8/1 are at v4

I am not sure how it compares to the parent painted mountain corn but I am quite happy with the short season it requires as that makes land using more flexible for me.

I planted on 5/8 and started picking the first ears on 8/13. That's 97 days. But the main crop won't be done for a few more weeks. It's highly variable, and a lot of the hills were replanted when nothing grew, and then the rains were erratic. Some of it is still pollinating now!

A final update on this topic... the second planting went well at first, but by the time the painted mountain corn was 12-18" tall, the rabbits decided to take a break from my sweet potato vines to eat nearly all the corn plants down to the ground. I had 4 plants survive to silk stage, & only 2 gave any seed...and by seed, I mean 3 kernels from 2 plants. So, I'll add those to my mixed Painted Mountain seed for another try.

Cy Cobb wrote:A final update on this topic... the second planting went well at first, but by the time the painted mountain corn was 12-18" tall, the rabbits decided to take a break from my sweet potato vines to eat nearly all the corn plants down to the ground. I had 4 plants survive to silk stage, & only 2 gave any seed...and by seed, I mean 3 kernels from 2 plants. So, I'll add those to my mixed Painted Mountain seed for another try.

You need some cats. Or a pellet gun!

Cy Cobb wrote:A final update on this topic... the second planting went well at first, but by the time the painted mountain corn was 12-18" tall, the rabbits decided to take a break from my sweet potato vines to eat nearly all the corn plants down to the ground. I had 4 plants survive to silk stage, & only 2 gave any seed...and by seed, I mean 3 kernels from 2 plants. So, I'll add those to my mixed Painted Mountain seed for another try.

I'll mail some seeds.

Thanks Thom. I run the rabbits out of the garden daily, but they don't stay gone long. I guess I need to break down & buy some chicken wire to keep them out. My neighbor used the 2' tall kind around his bush beans. It worked for awhile, but they eventually jumped it & wiped him out. By then though, the corn will be tall enough. I've learned that anywhere there's overhead cover from vines, be it cantaloupe, watermelon, pumpkins, or sweet potatoes, they just set up shop under the canopy. They sure have me feeling like Mr. McGregor the last few years.