We are experiencing summer storm season and the wind keeps blowing the corn down. Are there any ways to deal with this problem?

Thanks for the help, The Rookies

-- Sandy Downs (breezy@duo-county.com), July 05, 2001

Answers

Usually when the sun comes back out for a few days the corn will stand back up on its own. Hope this will be the case with yours.

-- athome (athome@home.com), July 05, 2001.

I sovled that problem by planting my corn in two 4 x 4 ft. square foot garden squares. I was skeptical on the outcome at first, but 121 did come up and are bearing. The tight concentration not only saves on space but keeps the stalks from going down past 10 degrees from center in high winds. Maybe you can try it next season.

-- Jay Blair in N. AL (jayblair678@yahoo.com), July 05, 2001.

Sandy, I had the same problem. My husband didn't plant the corn deep enough and Tropical Storm Allison came through NW Florida and blew it all down. I spent 4 hours picking them up , one by one , and just shoveled as much dirt around them as I could. Haven't had any problems since. So for now, just try to get as much dirt around them as you can, and next year as the corn comes up , pull the dirt up around them as much as you can so that the roots can really dig in and you shouldn't have a problem like this again. I'm also a rookie but learning every day. Good luck!

-- Pat (BigSisinPC@cs.com), July 05, 2001.

Go to what are really the archives but are called older messages here (below the active threads), go to "Gardening - General", do a search (CTRL F on a Microsoft system) on corn - you'll find lots. If you want the easy way, do a search on "flying saucer" instead.

-- Don Armstrong (darmst@yahoo.com.au), July 06, 2001.

Don, I had to laugh at your reference to flying saucers. I had forgotten that I had posted that thread last year. The corn did stand up again for the most part with the strings for support. Unfortunately, when the ears were ready, the racoons beat me to them and I didn't get even one ear from the patch. I ended up buying six bushels from the farmers' market and froze it off the cob. I am still using up the last of it and decided not to grow corn this year because of the problems I had. I'm sticking to the plants that the critters in my area aren't interested in like tomatoes, potatoes, eggplant, greenpeppers and basil. I did manage to cage some zucchini plants so I can have them as well.

-- Colleen (pyramidgreatdanes@erols.com), July 06, 2001.

Wind and sweet corn--ERR! Two days ago the mini ornamental corn went down, but not too bad and it has mostly popped back up. But, almost every year, the main sweet corn patch goes down. We've tried everything. I've used rock phosphate to strengthen the root system. We always hill twice. We plant Kandy Korn, which is supposed to be lodge resistant. I've also heard that Legend sweet corn is supposed to be lodge resistant. I'll have to try that next year. Now, our little homestead seems to be right where the wind blows the strongest, everyone comments on it, even my mom who lives only a few miles away. Just my sweet corn growing luck. I think too, it has something to do with the texture of the soil. I suppose I'm the only gardener to gripe about rich, fertile, soft deep soil, but everything grows so tall and blows over by the end of summer. Last year we estimated the corn about 9-10 feet high before it went over in a really bad thunderstorm. I just had to pull a patch of poppies and larkspur because they went over in a high wind a couple of weeks ago. They were about 4-5 feet high. I think I need to plant the shorter varieties of flowers.

-- vicki g. (thga76@aol.com), July 06, 2001.

I try to hill my corn twice during the growing stage. First is when the corn is about 6 to 8 inches high. This helps support the stalk incase of any high winds. The second time is when they are about waist to chest high. This is also for support, but also so the soil around the roots will not dry out. We had a big storm come through a couple of weeks ago that still laid my corn over but most of it bounced right back up.

-- Russell Hays (rhays@sstelco.com), July 07, 2001.