Pulsegleaner
Garden Master
- Joined
- Apr 18, 2014
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- Location
- Lower Hudson Valley, New York
It's DEFINITELY worth considering when I get to the end of the project (with the miniature sweetcorn kernels), since there I have VERY little (all together, collected from the three ears that had them, I have maybe 40 kernels total, and, as the three do not really resemble each other significantly, I should probably grow each one separately, so that's even less.)
Basically, I'm going down the list based on what I still have the most of and descending so it (at least if I keep it to the small stuff, I have nearly as many full sized corns to play around with as well) would run something like this.
Next year : Red ear I found elsewhere that appeared to be cross between strawberry and some field dent, with red kernelled dent from the stand added. I I recall all together that was about 638 kernels, so at 5-6 per hill (all of the stuff is old, so I factor for lowered germination) that should fill all of my 10'x10' (which I can theoretically push out to an 11x11 or even 12x12, if I have to.)
The mixed colored long eared dent with the tendency towards purple tones. May be a gourdseed (based on kernel shape) but if so, also either a shoepeg type or one with very messy rows.
Solid magenta dent, long ear. Only some kernels dented, but those have the deepest dents of all of my corns. Kernels REALLY irregular in shape, so HOPE saved ones as viable.
White yellow and pink dent, stubby ear, gourdseed, 24 rows (actually, I could have sworn it had 32 rows when I took it apart, but since I have been told that 24 is the maximum number of rows on an ear known, I was probably mistaken.
The sweet corn kernels, plus possibly the leftovers of the flour corn ones (since there are only three of those left.)
At some point in this process, I may also take a year off to grown miniature glass gem (of which I have a pint container of kernels, PLUS four intact ears, since this is the only one I have SO much of I could probably plant it directly and know the animals COULDN'T eat all of it before some grew too big for them to be interested in. Would have to do over two planting season, as three of the four intact ears are a different type (basically a miniature rice type corn with the Glass Gem palette.) I also have two seed sample from other people who claimed to have miniature glass gem, which are different from mine, and can get two more on Etsy if I so choose.)
And, as I said, I have plenty of full sized corns to work with as well, Checkered King (a stippled kernel three color dent) Freckled king (similar, but the kernels are narrower), the medium sized one with the magenta speckles and the tan pericarp, some stippled crystal flints/pops (Glass Gem is a crystal flint/pop in my classification system), Old Soft Soap if I have any left (a corn whose pericarp is so smooth and slippery it's hard to keep the kernels in your hand!) Paintbox (basically a full palette flour corn), and all of the Andean odds and ends I got from both the bodega haul and the later bodega bins. I may still have some Volta white lying around as well (I'm probably too cold for that, but if I could, It might be interesting to take the two non-white kernels I have (the stuff should really be called Volta Mostly White) and see if I can up their frequency (based on pictures I have seen from Ghana, someone may have already done that with the yellow, but it looks like they haven't with the purple).
I'll can grow stuff this year. Also have a friend that has 2+ acres in the country I'm going to ask if I can rent a garden space from her. She let someone grow some corn from Mexico (that they can't find up here) last year, so maybe ....
