[leekycauldron]

Hi all,

I planted 12 sweetcorn in a block, but I have lost at least 4 to wireworm

I've recently planted new seedlings to take their place, but I'm not sure whether they'll mature in time. I'm worried about pollination with so few plants. Is there any point carrying on, or perhaps I should just dig em up and plant something else?

Thanks

[mike1987]

ive had the same problem after dodgy germination and slugs/other pests i only have 5 plants i have left them in and planted another 20 seeds 10 direct and 10 on the windowsill hopefully they will catch up

[stentman]

Same here my well planned block planting has not happened due to poor germination pests etc. I reseeded some and planted ones grown in pots to fill the gaps, now if I can keep the slugs away we could be in business.

[Solidthegreat]

As a Newbie not sure about all this so i asked One of my Neighbours on their plot. They said that when the Corn are high enough, and are ready to pollinate, just bang the tops of the corn  together and they should pollinate each other. He did say it was a dusty job mind. He reckons it would work even if there were only 2 plants. Sounds feasible to me. So carry on i say.

[tode]

If you don't have many sweet-corn plants, you can always pollinate by hand, but Solidthegreat neighbour hasn't quite got it right:  you have to make sure that pollen from the flowers at the top of the plant get onto the silks (the hairy bits on the baby corn), which are much lower down.
This should be done a few times, on nice sunny days, when the pollen is really dry.

Good luck.

[bigben]

I had poor germination and had to resow some more but I then found out that it is not a good idea to mix types as they cross pollinate and you tend to get hybrids that are not as sweet - oh well hopefully some of the 30 plants will be ok.

[Goosegirl]

This is strange as my greenfingered neighbour had problems germination sweetcorn from both last year's and this year's kernels, yet I didn't. I have 2 blocks of them in different raised beds. I had a problem with just one that began to bite the dust for no obvious reason, The rest are doing fine. Bring on the pan of boiling water !!!