[Muddywaters]

Hi all I'm new to this forum & in my 2nd year on my allotment. Can anyone tell me,considering the current weather conditions is it safe to sow sweet corn now in pots in my unheated greenhouse?

[Nobbie]

No, much too early, they will just rot. Better to wait until it warms up in April/May - hopefully

[dannie]

planted mine last week in unheated greenhouse with a lid on the planting tray .

[JayG]

In warm conditions sweet corn will germinate in around a week, and be ready for planting out 2-3 weeks later in ideal conditions - don't know where you live Muddywaters because you have not put your location in your personal profile, but if you are anywhere in the UK you would be at least a month too early, especially this year (barring a continuous heatwave starting very soon!)

In current outdoor/unheated greenhouse conditions they are much more likely to rot than germinate.

[allot2learn]

Sweetcorn................. I knew I'd forgotten something. Need more seeds................. 

[Muddywaters]

Thanks all. I live in Manchester. Think I will leave it a few weeks before I sow.

[mumofstig]

I'm down Souf and didn't start my sweetcorn til 20th April last year............it'll be later than that this year 

[richyrich7]

Way too early, but the easiest way to germinate them is to put them in a ice cream tub on top of some damp tissue, put the lid on and leave somewhere warm, check them every day , soon as the roots start growing pot them up paper pots are best 
Watch out if you don't take the lid off every day you can get a mould start to grow.

A very easy way to pre-germinate sweetcorn.  But not yet 

[MoreWhisky]

Ages to sweetcorn sowing yet.
This is defiantly one crop you need to get the timing right.

[Trillium]

Corn are like beans - if the soil isn't warm enough they simply won't sprout, and the few that do will struggle to grow in cold weather. They're known as a high heat units plant, meaning, if it isn't warm enough, forget it. So definitely wait.

[parsley]

Ooops 

[Totty]

On the flip side, sweetcorn needs a longish growing season in the uk. I have 80 seeds just chitted and potted into 3 inch pots today. Will be chitting another 75 nearer the middle of April, they will probably go into peat pots that can be planted out but with the earlier ones I like to be able to pot up if the weather is still not right for planting out.

Totty

[JayG]

Too true Totty, although you probably get a few more weeks of sweetcorn-friendly weather where you are compared with us a bit further up!

Doesn't alter the fact that if planted out in temperatures too cool they just sulk and do nothing - as often as not in the last few years it's an Indian summer that has come to the rescue of the later cobs  (didn't happen last year though.  )