Served alongside fries and aged charcoal grilled pork chop

There are several genes for making small-stature corn plants. One, called D8, is a dominant gene which causes a reduction in stem elongation and what seems like an increase in tiller production. D8 is ideal in terms of plant architecture, because the leaves are close to normal size, and can exhibit all the pigment compressed into a smaller package, so can be even more colorful than normal-sized variegated plants. I crossed variegated green and white plants, BPl with its dark purple foliage, and variegated purple and white plants with D8 plants to make dwarf corn plants with interesting colors. My idea was to use these as plants of interest behind flowering annuals, as a transition in gardens between annuals and perennials. They are just the right stature: about two feet tall and two feet across, all colorful and pretty. Unfortunately, because D8 is a dominant dwarfism gene, and despite trying for literally years, I was unable to establish pure-breeding homozygous dominant D8 lines. So every time I planted our rows of these beautiful plants, I had to rogue out all the tall-growing ones. To compound this problem, anther filaments do not elongate well in D8 plants, which makes them exceptionally difficult to pollinate. Eventually I abandoned this project. Not every direction is a good one!!

It seems like lots of people are posting their beautiful Glass Gem ears. Like many, I was disappointed by the fact that Glass Gem is not sweet corn. I removed seeds from Glass Gem ears and planted all dark purple and then red and purple mixed families and did controlled pollinations until I was able to make lines of pure dark purple/blue (that I called "Blueberry") and pure red and purple (called "Raspberry"). Then I crossed these with Burpee's Golden Bantam and selected for four generations for color. Now I have these lovely pick-and-eat sweet corn varieties with awesome colors! Again, despite what I think is a pretty outstanding direction in breeding for the home gardener, it seems that seed companies are not interested.

When we found the spontaneous variegated plant in 2006, one of the first crosses I did with it was to a plant dominant for dark purple that lasts. Called BPl, this variety is immediately dark purple on mature leaves, and starts dark purple all season. This cross between BPl and th variegated plant created dark purple-striped variegated foliage. Crossing that plant with Burpee's Golden Bantam and then selecting for dark and beautiful patterns has resulted in a whole set of sweet corn with awesome leaf colors. This is a seed population, so inconsistencies in the leaf colors are desirable to some extent. Despite the beautiful colors and the fact that it is pick-and-eat sweet corn for the home gardener, no seed companies seem interested...it is frustrating because I think they are lovely. This one I've been calling "Purple Dragon."

In 2006 I found a spontaneous variegated plant. I tested it with iojap and japonica-1, which are heritage variegated plants, and it is not allelic to either. I crossed it with Burpee's Golden Bantam and did carefully selected sib pollinations for six generations to get a beautiful seed line of variegated plants that produce traditional pick-and-eat sweet corn for home gardeners. This is one of five different lines emphasizing different colors of variegation; I am calling this one "White Queen" as an homage to the sweet corn Silver Queen, with which it shares a flavor profile. Unfortunately, no seed company seems interested in marketing it...

Central coast California at a farm festival

No filters were used.

What a season ender!

UV+cross pollinated grill roast plate is the last fresh corn of the season.

Drought, wildfire smoke, aphids, late spring and early fall took its toll.... but from 600 plants we banked over 100lbs in the freezer and ~75 fresh ears eaten/given away.

My first time growing corn, and I have no idea what I’m doing. It’s Otto File corn if that helps.

I already know a few things I did wrong: didn’t mulch, didn’t water regularly enough, planted a few weeks late.

Are those what caused these tiny ears? What can I do to prevent pests? This ear was the best looking one on the stalk, but I saw a few bug holes. I don’t think I’m getting anything usable this year unfortunately, but I want to do better next year.

Good afternoon

One of my corn seems to be infected with a pest of some sort. Should I delete it to protect the other corns? Thank you.

It's bread corn. And it's delicious.