[strangerachael]

Why does my sweetcorn have patches of undeveloped kernels? It rarely seems to look as well formed as the pictures in the seed catalogue. Have I just picked it too soon?

[cawdor2001]

could have something to do with them not being properly fertilised, especially if you spaced them too far apart or not in a block.  Some of mine did not have kernals formed to the top and smaller cobs lower down were not great probaly because their emergence did not coincide with flowering of the male part.


Cawdor

[gobs]

Undeveloped patches of kernels can happen due to cold weather, insect injury to flowers or bad pollination, often resulting from uneven plant development, ie. they do not shed pollen at the same time as each other.

Too close spacing, so lack of nutrition also will affect ear development.

[strangerachael]

Thanks - that's interesting. I did plant them in a block, but they may have been too far apart.

[gobs]

:? OMG!

The problem Cowder has is rather differnet to yours, Angel, however similar it might seem.

So how too far did you plant them? Bearing in mind they will still pollinate at about 15 metre range.

And how did that affect them? :?

[nuts-in-may]

:!:

[gobs]

The male flower on the top is the tassel and the female down is the cob or ear.

Good he is!  Considering that the mature pollen grains are viable for a few minutes only... never mind other things. :roll:

No harm in stroking them though, I suppose. Bar possibly ruining the silk. :?

[gobs]

Have you got a photo of these cobs and plants by any chance, guys?

[cawdor2001]

Eaten all of mine or removed kernals and frozen.  Tasted lovely  

Cawdor

[gobs]

Eaten all of mine or removed kernals and frozen.  Tasted lovely  

Yes, they taste just the same perfick tip fill or not.

But if you don't get much kernels all along the cob, that's a bit of a pain.

BTW, I hope we are not talking tiller cobs here, those are just supposed to be like that.  

[strangerachael]

Thanks for all the suggestions - I will experiment next year with planting distance, stroking and shaking!!

[paintedlady]

 Don't forget to do the corn dance while you are at it!

Seed packets usually give an indication of distance between plants and that is usually 18 inch - 2 foot apart (depending on cultivar).

My personal experience of a bad crop so far (ie patchy kernel development) has been rain day after day just when the male flower starts to mature  :evil:

[strangerachael]

Yes, the more I think about it, I'm sure it wasn't planting distance that was to blame, more likely circumstances beyond my control, eg weather conditions.

[SnooziSuzi]

a lot of mine polinated but with all of the dark rainy weather we've had they just didn't ripen  :cry:

Oh well, there's always next year!

[luckypurplebutterfly]

I probably just got luck with mine this year but I did stroke them, hubby made rather rude comments about it!

Some of mine are less developed on the very pointy tip but they are fine the rest of the way down. I didn't do anything very special though, just tried to follow the instructions on the packet