Allotment Gardening Advice Help Chat
Growing => Growing in Greenhouses & Polytunnels => Topic started by: Ali Wood on July 03, 2014, 09:40
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Can anyone help, my sweetcorn is flowering and scattering pollen everywhere, but there are no cobs or tassels forming yet for it to land on! Last year they were quite advanced before they flowered, and much taller.I'm afraid by the time they form all the flowering will be over with!
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It's often a close-run thing, and if I were a sweet corn plant I'd try to synchronise the appearance of the tassels and the silks a bit better!. ;)
They usually do OK in the end, although there is something to be said for slightly staggering the sowing and planting out by about 2 weeks - although the later ones tend to catch up the slight difference in timing can help the earlier ones pollinate if they are planted adjacently (the second batch preferable upwind of the first.)
Only problem with doing that though is if you get a bad summer, which can mean you run out of time to ripen everything before it turns cooler.
Welcome to the forums by the way - are your sweet corn outside or in a greenhouse, and what is your (approximate) location?
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Hi, I'm growing in a polytunnel, it's our second 'proper' year growing. We are down in Cornwall, and are generally lucky temperature wise here, but suffer sea breezes! My corn grew so well behaved last year I was a little thrown that it's out of sync!
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Ah, Cornwall + PT = sweet corn a lot more advanced than mine are! ;)
Hopefully being indoors the tassels will hang on to their pollen long enough for the silks to catch up.
Do you shake the plants to pollinate or do the sea breezes get inside the PT to do it for you?
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tend to shake by hand, breezes tend to hit the poly side on, if the wind changes direction watch out, you tend to get a hoolie right up through and have to close it up a bit!
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With the continuing lovely weather, maybe the plants are a bit in front of themselves, with the cobs struggling to keep up with the go ahead male thing. Especially in a polytunnel where the temperature can really be a little too warm early on for the varieties we use. I have a sea breeze in Devon and my corn are outside, but I would say even some of my tassels are definitely forming earlier this year than is normal for my plot. As JayG says, it's always a close run thing with the first silks taking a seeming age to appear, hence the need for block and somewhat staged sowing for the small crops we grow. It's not like growing a field of the stuff where the cobs are permanently in a sea of fertilising plankton. If it were me, I would try and keep the temperature down and the tunnel open as much as possible. Not much more one can do.
I have tried growing corn in the greenhouse, but don't anymore as it seemed a bit too hit and miss for me with the small number of plants I could fit in. Corn grows perfectly well outside down here every year, and with a bigger block of plants, probably better outside, in my experience
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Thanks, I think it could well be the high heat this year, corn is flowering at a much shorter height than last year and keeping the poly cool is hard, even with shading temperatures are in the mid 30's most days. Might just buy a hammock and a wine cooler....
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I've been thinking for a while about getting a polytunnel to augment the greenhouse. But, in my mind, they do bring their own logic, a little different to that of a greenhouse. Because they are mostly much bigger than a greenhouse, their main use for me would be to plant up with a much wider variety of crop, not just the Summer tom/cucumber/pepper/aubergine thing. In fact I would want to use one as a means to extend the season either end. In Cornwall, I've always noticed most polys for strawberries are rolled up and very open most of the time to the elements come April, not only for pollination needs, but for essential heat control. Too cold is a problem, but so is too hot.
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Can anyone help, my sweetcorn is flowering and scattering pollen everywhere, but there are no cobs or tassels forming yet for it to land on! Last year they were quite advanced before they flowered, and much taller.I'm afraid by the time they form all the flowering will be over with!
The fallen pollen should still be there waiting on the leaves until the cob sproutings are ready to be pollinated - let's hope so. Maybe outdoor ones get it together better?