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Post by MikeH on Jan 25, 2012 7:29:41 GMT -5
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Post by Alan on Feb 19, 2012 11:25:40 GMT -5
Wow, just saw this and glad I did. Adding to the list of wanted germplasm for Amanda Palmer!
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Post by traab on Feb 20, 2012 12:55:16 GMT -5
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Post by johninfla on Feb 21, 2012 14:18:15 GMT -5
I just looked at that picture on wisdom of corn. It shows what looks like an ear of corn at the base of the tassel. I have that on my maiz morado and aso have what look like tassels coming out of the top of an ear. I bet it's a complicated subject but I'm curious to know what causes that?
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Post by darwinslair on Feb 21, 2012 17:11:59 GMT -5
I have had that happen on a lot of my old cors, but never consistently. Have even had open cobs form at the top on the tassel, or individual kernels, but the birds decimate those pretty well.
No idea what causes it. Some throwback gene I suppose.
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Post by 12540dumont on Feb 21, 2012 19:01:48 GMT -5
I asked Carol Deppe that same question, and she said the same thing, a throwback to a more primitive corn. There are so many genes in corn, they even have jumping genes! waynesword.palomar.edu/transpos.htm (now that's a pretty corn).
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Post by traab on Feb 21, 2012 19:19:07 GMT -5
Some of these traits are part of old varieties and if selected out will diminish the variety. People have valued some of these traits and sometimes encouraged them for their uses.
In generations past multiple ears per stalk were valued when harvest was by hand but machine harvesting encourages a preference for single ears per stalk. Keeping older varieties has reoriented my thinking about what is a trait to keep.
I had Morado ears with tassels from the top of the ear and the base as well. This allowed the ear to be pollinated when the tassel at the top of the plant had shed pollen weeks before the ear had put out silk. Side tassel branches at the base of the ear had kernels and farther up produced pollen to fertilize the ear.
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Post by DarJones on Feb 22, 2012 1:02:29 GMT -5
You will need to look at teosinte to understand the tassel vs ear issue. Originally, all corn grew with tassels at the top and immediately beneath the tassels were a few seed grains. That trait is still buried in the corn genome.
DarJones
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Post by johninfla on Feb 22, 2012 12:06:45 GMT -5
Traab, do you make chicha morada with your maiz morado? And are you still growing it? If you grow it this year maybe we could swap some seed? Ours makes great chicha, and I had some left over when I planted this weekend so I ground it for grits....It was a little funky eating purple grits but tasted great!
John
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Deleted Member
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Post by Deleted on Feb 23, 2012 1:23:01 GMT -5
I didn't know about the ear tassels being an old trait. I always thought they were due to some sort of hormonal issue. Since they're right above and beside the kernels, wouldn't the ear tassels cause self-pollination and inbreeding depression?
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Post by darwinslair on Feb 23, 2012 2:38:48 GMT -5
I didn't know about the ear tassels being an old trait. I always thought they were due to some sort of hormonal issue. Since they're right above and beside the kernels, wouldn't the ear tassels cause self-pollination and inbreeding depression? if you only saved seed from that one cob it likely would. Tom
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Post by turtleheart on Feb 23, 2012 6:21:26 GMT -5
Some of these traits are part of old varieties and if selected out will diminish the variety. People have valued some of these traits and sometimes encouraged them for their uses. In generations past multiple ears per stalk were valued when harvest was by hand but machine harvesting encourages a preference for single ears per stalk. Keeping older varieties has reoriented my thinking about what is a trait to keep. my corn will show up to 7 ears per plant, and about 3-4 in 100 show hermaphroditism in the female and male organs. many plants are smaller and produce one ear. i dont often esteem plants like those equally to those that are taller and have fruited more. i dont understand why anyone would ever even want to. if anyone does sweet corn i have been segregating the sweets that have popped out. they are certainly unique to anything else out there in sweet corn. nobody else in the world grows my flour corn which it came from. i would be willing to part with them as i never grow sweets.
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Post by DarJones on Feb 23, 2012 13:33:07 GMT -5
The Floury gene(s) are bad news for sweet corn. Floury causes accumulation of soft starch in the kernel. The Sweet gene reduces formation of hard starch but not of soft starch from the floury gene. In other words, if you grow out a sweet corn from a flour corn background, you will have to spend several generations of breeding to get rid of the floury traits.
This is the reason why most sweet corns are derived from flint background.
It is part of the reason why my cross of Cherokee Squaw X Silver King will take a few generations of work to stabilize since Cherokee Squaw is a soft dent variety. Soft Dent produces a small amount of floury starch in the center of the kernel surrounded by a thin layer of hard starch.
DarJones
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Post by keen101 (Biolumo / Andrew B.) on Feb 23, 2012 17:02:53 GMT -5
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Post by traab on Feb 23, 2012 18:55:41 GMT -5
Great photos Keen101!
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