Allotment Gardening Advice Help Chat
Growing => Grow Your Own => Topic started by: JayG on July 30, 2017, 12:15
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Ignoring all those who claim to have been eating theirs for over a week already (:tongue2:) I think it's fair to say my Earlibird enjoyed June's weather a lot more than this month's, but I suppose they're about at the stage they usually are now - about 5-6' tall including the tassels which have appeared in the past week.
As ever, the lady silks are mostly still powdering their noses backstage, so the weather in the next week or so will no doubt determine how well the cobs set.
After today the forecast looks reasonable (i.e. not too much rain), so fingers crossed...
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Funny you should mention sweet corn JG, look below what's in my bicycle basket today. :)
The first two of my Sundance, which nearly always start harvesting the last couple of days in July. They're a bit staggered this year due to seed germination problems but should be ok as most tassels appeared within a week or two of each other.
My Golden Bantam, are about 3 weeks behind, and the first silks on two plants are just showing.
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trying a variety this year called golden hinde hopefully we mite get to harvest some sweet corn as last year our local badger got there first so this year its in a raised bed with a strong wire fence round it and as yet fingers crossed its kept him at bay
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A cautionary badger tale Rowland. Badgers decimated crops all over our site two years ago. Last year I put up a non see through fence and my crop was fine. Others who just put up chicken wire and the like lost the lot. This year my neighbour was a week ahead of me and he lost his crop again with just a wire fence. I did tell him wire fences won't do the trick once they know the corn is there.... they're proper tanks. My 40 sundance, touch wood, are still ok and now just starting to harvest today. But see below in an out of focus picture my opaque fence. A bit over the top, but I only have it up for 3 weeks while the cobs are maturing.
My later 40 golden bantam, also pictured below, are 3 weeks behind with male tassels just about to start dusting, and I am hoping my first crop will harvest in time for me to take down the fence and erect it around the second crop as they start to mature. But I'm cutting it fine and may just be too late for the second crop. It's all a bit ugly but it's the only way to get a crop here now. A few years ago there was no badger problem, just the odd early fox or wabbit that did minimal damage. It's usually just as the corn are perfect that the badgers strike, a bit like gooseberries and squirrels, and almost always the whole lot go in one night, the ones that are mature. It's like a Jaws frenzy.
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Ours are about 6' tall, peeled back one corn yesterday, tassels brown, one kernel still slightly watery. Will try again in about a week.
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We only grow about two dozen, and had the first two a couple of days ago. Bog standard GC plants put in 20th May.
Very sweet and crisp too, but we'll leave the rest for a week to fill out...
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i like the idea of a non see through fence VP can you elaborate a bit more on what you used because it sounds like something we should try
you see most of our raised beds have been covered in strong plastic net and we do have some heavy duty scaffold net and your rite the badgers decimated our parsnip crop last year
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My Double Red variety has shot up in the last week. It is now 4-5 feet tall, with tassels all showing and 2 cobs on each plant so far. It seems to stand up quite well despite recent wind. The colour is quite spectacular. I will take a picture tomorrow.
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My Golden Bantam is now 6 1/2 foot high and producing plenty of cobs.
As it normally does, most have set three cobs per plant and a few have set four.
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i like the idea of a non see through fence VP can you elaborate a bit more on what you used because it sounds like something we should try
We do the same for rabbits and muntjac - what they cant see they dont know is there. We started using cheap fleece and weed fabric on canes to test the theory, on the basis that there was little to lose and we could chuck at the end of the season. Sadly it doesn't last a season so much time was wasted making do etc.
This year I have been making fences with metre wide cheap fabric from my fabric store, jumble sales, old semi sheer curtains. Interesting mix of colours. Channel sewn top and bottom to run a string through to hang it from and secure it, and then tie to canes. Working great and should last longer before they succumb to the UV light.
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i like the idea of a non see through fence VP can you elaborate a bit more on what you used because it sounds like something we should try
you see most of our raised beds have been covered in strong plastic net and we do have some heavy duty scaffold net and your rite the badgers decimated our parsnip crop last year
Almost anything that won't rip easily in the wind. For the last 2 years I have bashed some 2 x 2 posts into the ground and screwed two sheets of 4 feet by 4 feet chipboard I had lying around to them at one corner, so as to give the structure some strength on our windy site. The rest of the fence consists of some flexible meter wide ( high ) rubberised roofing material that blew onto my plot in a gale 3 years ago LOL, but something that doesn't rip easily like bitumen roofing materials tend to do. To be honest, I would imagine anything non see through would do the job, say from a damp proof membrane upwards. As we know badgers are very strong creatures, burrow under fences etc, but just maybe they're a bit dense in some ways, and just maybe they can't smell the corn or something. Maybe short sighted too, who knows, whatever works. There's so much for them to eat on allotment sites this time of year alongside their favourite worms, that they don't have to really search and pull down everything for a meal. Of course, when they do happen across sweet corn, there's no stopping them. The corn only has to be protected for a month at the very most at the business end, so there isn't really a light issue for young plants. i have just spotted the usual communal badger toilet that appears every Summer on my plot. It's only 3 meters away from my corn. They must be passing every night I would imagine. So far so good.
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After today the forecast looks reasonable (i.e. not too much rain), so fingers crossed...
Forecast changed dramatically later that day, as has the actual weather ever since - lots of rain and today very windy too, neither of which are at all helpful for pollination. :nowink:
As for badgers, a couple of years ago I had a badger latrine appear right next to my block of sweetcorn as it was ripening, and it was definitely being used every night (yuk!)
They never touched the sweetcorn though - perhaps these particular ones prefer savoury to sweet, although I might yet live to regret saying that. ::)
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It's pointless trying to grow them outside up here in Cumbria so I grow them in the polytunnel from seed I started in the propagator. I have an absolute glut all ripening together. 50 Swift and Rising Sun plants all ready for eating now. Only trouble with growing them in the tunnel is that they reach the roof at 8ft high and then I worry about wear and tear on the tunnel itself
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Looking good, several cobs on each plant though not ripe yet. Grown outside. I am so pleased as this was from a packet of seed from 1986 found in the shed when we took on our plot in March. It is an F1 variety no longer on existence, Kelvedon Sweetheart. I only planted them as an experiment, just goes to show how long some seed will keep if sealed.
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Looking good, several cobs on each plant though not ripe yet. Grown outside. I am so pleased as this was from a packet of seed from 1986 found in the shed when we took on our plot in March. It is an F1 variety no longer on existence, Kelvedon Sweetheart. I only planted them as an experiment, just goes to show how long some seed will keep if sealed.
Wow 31 years.
Hope they produce a good crop for you.
Might be worth saving some of your seed from the crop, they may have lost their F1 hybrid characteristics after all that time, haha!
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we are actually picking sweet corn this year instead of the badger and there lovely and sweet some for tea some in the freezer
what's the variety F1 golden hind very sweet very tasty well worth the effort fencing them in badger proof going to grow more sweet corn next year
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Well done Rowland, opaque fencing for 5 or 6 weeks is the answer. I had another square of corn that I didn't fence and they all got nobbled. They were almost a sacrificial crop in my mind., one for us, one for them.
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We lost a few plants to rabbits :( then the cat got the rabbit :lol: so i fenced round it no more trouble,we have picked all the corn,about 40 cobs,some in the freezer,some went to the chickens.
I could have lost the lot so i was very happy with the result,and very tasty to :).
I will be growing more next year well worth ago.
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Just been pulling up the sweetcorn plants and now into the compost.
Picked the last crop over the weekend.
Another great crop this year of Golden Bantam, had 32 plants and just one ended up only half size and produced just one cob. Most produced three cobs, about four plants had only two cobs and eight plants had four cobs.
Tasty, no growing issues and about 2/3 is in freezer tubs for the next year to use.
Have saved some seed too this year far a fun experiment as directed from some on here.
Such an easy veg crop to grow with no problems growing it, except the height :)
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Can't claim to have achieved anything like Lettice's yield with this year's Earlibird, but then again it's done at least as well as Swift and Lark (and a few others I can't remember the names of) over the years.
Worries about pollination given the cool, windy, and sometimes wet weather were unfounded - I've been picking delicious well-filled cobs for a couple of weeks now, and although the poor August weather delayed ripening it has helped them stay in prime condition for longer on the plants, which is just as well given that my freezer is stuffed with home made tomato sauces! ::)
Still harvesting the first cob on each plant - many have a second cob but they are mostly suspiciously skinny...
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Disastrous. Very poor germination with Mirai Picnic, consequently not enough plants for good pollination, back to Swift next year which hasn't let me down in the past.