Questions about GMO, Corn Genetics and some Corn Pictures

[reed]

I think that is what I will do. Plant this to increase my supply of it for the next year, it's most important to just try to do that because it is the only ear like this I'v seen. I'm thinking though that I can still get a head start on a possible landrace  by mixing in some others and detasseling them.

I have another ear that is also pretty good flavor. It is similar sized and shape except it only has 14 rows instead of 16. It has a clear pericarp with just a little pink to it so is easy to see endosperm color. It is about 2/3 yellow but I will just plant the white and detassel it. Next is one of my own that is about half the length and more rows. It has clear pericarp with red chinmarks and about a 1/3 of them are all white otherwise. It also tastes, pretty good. I have some Cherokee White Flour so a few plants of that might be included.  I can throw in some of those sweet corns I have accumulated especially the white ones, maybe even some of the se types. And some darker red kernels from some of the more flinty ears (but just those with white endosperm) . Then last but not least the white version of Magic Manna and a generous dose of Cascade Cream Cap.

If things go right I'll end up with lots more of just big red, maybe even a few just like it  and several more interesting other things to dissect and taste the next year. I won't use the Painted Mountain  because of all it's different colors and I didn't like the flavor so much.

I can also still do my mass crossing of sweets with the white Magic Manna and CCC instead of Painted Mountain and just make sure none of it is still tasseling when Big Red gets its silks. I'd eventually like to also just have white endosperm sweet but I don't know what color a lot of them are except a couple of the super early ones like Orchard Baby and Yukon Supreme are definitely yellow. Who knows what color Fire on the Mountain, Hookers, Aztec, and the others are. All the se types are white except Ruby Queen. I don't have much of most of them and am hesitant to open the packages to get some out to dissect. 

I would eventually like to have two kinds of corn. One a very short season sweet and the other my winter use dry corn with both being diverse and adaptable. I could plant the sweet twice each season and time it to tassel before and after the other one. Other people could plant it successively from April to July, folks around here would jump on a tasty sweet corn they could do that with.  

This is gonna be lots of fun. Thanks again every one for your help and advice. Carol, you will be getting my order soon. 

[reed]

Well, maybe I was wrong that I never saw another ear like the one I keep going on about. I forgot about this one.



I guess I'll call it Little Red, it was in the bag I planned to feed to the chickens, originally not considered because of its size. It has apx 130 total kernels instead of 600 and each one is about 1/2 the size of a Big Red Kernel so overall it is about 20% the size.  It isn't exactly the same color almost a purplish or pinkish shine depending on lighting. The aleurone is similar to Big Red but it is only about 20% white endosperm, the rest is two or three shades of yellow.

BUT, it has a very similar great flavor and the qualities of no unpleasant hard chunks or shells. Don't know if I want to mix it in to start but think I should find it a spot to increase it too, just to keep future options open. 

add - There was one other difference. To remove the pericarp I soak kernels in hot tap water for an hour. Big Red stained it a light pink, Little Red's water was noticeably darker and kinda purplish. 

[blueadzuki]

Topping off Carols advice, it occurs to me that, if the corns are that good at staining the water, then down the road when and if you DO decide the time has come to begin selecting amoungs your Big and Little Red Skins*, making chicha morado might be a good way to absorb any kernels that have the "right" pericarp (dark red) but the "wrong" insides (yellow, or aleurone colors you don't want). It's pretty easy to do, really good for you (that red color is LOADED with antioxidants) and since the red color is pretty much ALL the corn contributes, the nature of the insides should be irrelevant. There are PLENTY of recipes available on the web; just pick one that seems to work for you. Assuming I still go through with planting it, that's what I'll probably end up doing with the dark fuschia stuff I have, since I don't want it in my general population (since my goal is making a corn line with heavy stipple and as colorful base as I can get, I'm trying to minimize to avoid colored pericarps, since, in my opinion, while some of the shades of red and pink are attractive in themselves, they tend to make the aleurone colors under them look really ugly.)

Speaking of which I got my hands on this ear a two weeks ago.
The pictures a bit too blurry to see it (and as long as I am stuck with my phone camera, I can't take a better one) but a lot of these kernels have an INCREDIBLY nice stipple (on the level of the Freckled King kernels I showed you all a while back) with the bonus of a truly wide color base (As I mentioned, a lot of my best stippled material came from cobs where there is only one aleurone color (over the standard white yellow hetero most ornamental corns have) so the actual ear palette is rather limited) In fact this one is so nice I think I'll save it separately, and then take some year and plant JUST from this ear so it doesn't get drowned out in the mix with everything else (with my limited space, 100 corn plants is the absolute maximum I can do (and if I space/thin them appropriately, a lot less than that, so multiple patches in the same year is not really feasible, and I have to pick one corn plan per year (though with the critter damage it usually goes into something more along the lines of "what can I use to fill in the gaps the critters have made, and then what do I have to fill in the gaps they'll put in THAT." Or why I tend to do "trait landraces" (kernels whose only connection between each other is a trait I am after (stippling, being a miniature non pop etc.) rather than "prime ear" selections (like this one would be, or reeds big red would, where you find an ear you really like and use that as the prime base)

* Little inside joke. Big Red Robe (Da Hong Pao) and Little Red Robe are two types of very expensive fine tea (little red robe is basically a fourth generation vegetative clone of Big, that while still considered good is considered less good (and therefore cheaper than the "true" Da Hong Pao). I found your Big and Little red a funny comparison (and yes, there are people who call the second one Little Red Riding Hood Tea)

[diane]

Reed, were you able to find the name of the corn the grower of Big Red planted?

[Carol Deppe]

Dec 4, 2014 5:38:51 GMT -5 reed said:

I think that is what I will do. Plant this to increase my supply of it for the next year, it's most important to just try to do that because it is the only ear like this I'v seen. I'm thinking though that I can still get a head start on a possible landrace  by mixing in some others and detasseling them.

I think this is a good approach. Basically, it's pursuing two approaches at once. Since plant breeding is so delightfully unpredicatable, I usually do just this sort of thing. Figure out more than one approach and try them all. Usually the first year doesn't take much work, and you can figure out what it's best to continue with by the results of the first year. In this case, you would grow a patch of the kernels from the special ear mostly to increase and preserve the genes in that material. But then simultaneously you would be giving the material a chance to show what it can do if you just select from it while simultaneously trying some crosses. The crosses not only give you options as to how to continue. They also can give you information about what is going on with your special ear genetically.

In addition to the white line of Magic Manna, I would suggest also planting Mandan Clay Red (aka Parching Lavender Mandan) one of the parching corns I rediscovered and described in that article on parching corn that has been mentioned. It is homozygous for lavender, which is (codominant) purple/black aleurone as modified by homozygous recessive red-aleurone. Mandan Clay Red is very early, almost as early as Painted Mountain. Ears are smaller. But that is undoubtedly because of inbreeding in part, and will self-correct in a cross. MCR is uniform for color. Clear pericarp, homozygous purple plus red-aleurone genes, homozygous white flinty endosperm. (You can get it from Adaptive Seeds, Seed Dreams, or from the USDA.) 

Fact is, from the photos it is obvious your special ear has a deep red pericarp. But I can't tell whether you have a white aleurone that has been stained reddish from the pericarp (which might be because of the soaking in hot water), or whether you actually have a lavender aleurone. Or both. I think the aleurone has been stained red from the pericarp, but can't tell whether it would have been white otherwise, or was lavender.  (The hot water soak was probably counterproductive and screwed up ability to determine aleurone color by staining it with pigment from the pericarp.)

Let's suppose, however, that you plant a detasselled row of the mostly white line of Magic Manna (Pancake White Manna) and a detasseled row of Mandan Clay Red. If your special ear is red pericarp over white aleurone, then in the cross to the white Manna you will end up with all white aleurones. (And that cross would be a good one to go forward with to develop a new variety). And furthermore, you will be able to pick out and discard nearly all the contaminating yellow flint. However, if your special ear is red pericarp over lavender (Purple plus red-aleurone) the white manna ears will have nearly all kernels that are either purple/black or lavender aleurone. (So you will learn what is going on with your special ear, but this won't be the right cross to go on with.)

Now consider the cross to the detasseled Mandan Clay Red. If your special ear is red pericarp over white aleurone, you'll end up with heterozygosity for purple and red aleurone colors, so lots of pastels or mosaics. And this wouldn't be the right cross to go on with. But if your special ear is red pericarp over lavender aleurone, then you will get nearly all lavender aleurones in the cross, and this would be a great cross to go on with. the lavender aleurone itself gives a wonderful parching corn flavor. And the red pericarp does too.

[Carol Deppe]

Dec 4, 2014 5:38:51 GMT -5 reed said:

I used to grow 'Hookers Sweet Indian'. It was an early black sweet corn from maritime Washington. It was very uniformly white flint under the black aleurone. I've seen some lines recently that have a good bit of yellow in them, indicating contaminating crossing somewhere along the line. I bought some that Territorial reintroduced last year, and while I haven't planted it yet, I have inspected it for interior color. It appears to be all or nearly all white.

Black Aztec also should be white flint underneath the black aleurone if it is pure and the real thing.

[Carol Deppe]

Dec 4, 2014 5:38:51 GMT -5 reed said:

Next is one of my own that is about half the length and more rows. It has clear pericarp with red chinmarks and about a 1/3 of them are all white otherwise. It also tastes, pretty good.

I would suggest keeping this ear separate as a whole project of its own instead of crossing it to your special red ear. The reason is that that chinmark characteristic is itself a great parching flavor (when over white), but is a quite different flavor from the red. But in addition, the pericarp colors are alternatives. So when you have the chinmark pattern you will not have the deepest possible red pattern and flavor 

I'd plant a little semiisolated patch of the chinmark ear kernels, and among them plant some detasseled White Manna. 

I'm actually breeding a chinmark sister line to Magic Manna. I think it will be pure enough to introduce in 2016.

[Carol Deppe]

Dec 5, 2014 5:47:22 GMT -5 reed said:

Well, maybe I was wrong that I never saw another ear like the one I keep going on about. I forgot about this one.

I guess I'll call it Little Red, it was in the bag I planned to feed to the chickens, originally not considered because of its size. It has apx 130 total kernels instead of 600 and each one is about 1/2 the size of a Big Red Kernel so overall it is about 20% the size.  It isn't exactly the same color almost a purplish or pinkish shine depending on lighting. The aleurone is similar to Big Red but it is only about 20% white endosperm, the rest is two or three shades of yellow.

BUT, it has a very similar great flavor and the qualities of no unpleasant hard chunks or shells. Don't know if I want to mix it in to start but think I should find it a spot to increase it too, just to keep future options open. 
. 

This ear could easily be from the same plant as your favorite ear. A small ear because it was the second or third ear on the plant instead of the first. More yellow endosperm because of who happened to be pollinating nearby when the smaller ear was in silk. A somewhat different shade because red percarp is variable in expression, and varies in shade from ear to ear on the same plant as well as even from one end of the ear to the other.

[reed]

blueadzuki, I haven't forgotten you. When I get some time I will sort through the other corn for nice stipple ones. I already shelled a lot of it but there was quite a bit in there so I'm sure I can find some. I'll focus on just clear pericarp with white endosperm and good stipple. Might not be soon but before time to plant next year.

diane, I know the guy's name and have a cell number but he never answers it, just the message "voice mail not set up". I think he might be Amish. I thought I found him but when I went to visit it was the wrong guy. I'll track him down eventually.

[blueadzuki]

I don't care about endosperm, it can be white or yellow. In fact I LIKE it that way. I'm after MAXIMUM color after all, and that means that having the endosperm mixed is GOOD for me. Plus I've got a lot more white than yellow, so my yellow could use a buffering.

On my side, I think I may have one or two more little samples I can send you that might help down the road. In particular I can probably spare some of that supersized one I showed the picture of earlier (the high soft center one) It's clear peri already, and if I only send white kernels, that should rogue out most to all of the aleurone issues (I'm assuming that colorless aleurone is recessive to pretty much ALL the colors so white stays white)

[reed]

Carol Deppe, I never thought the big and little ears could have come from the same plant although I'v seen that kind of thing plenty of times, I just didn't put two and two together. Completely forgot what I have learned when I mentioned planting red kernels from some of the other ears, red kernels don't count if the whole ear wasn't red! Also didn't think about how it effects things it pollinates can give me clues about it. I'll get some of the Mandan Clay too.

I tried to remove pericarp without soaking but it was very difficult and I was afraid I was scratching or chipping too deep. I'll try again with renewed determination. Or maybe the filing method will work. I have 4 bags of 115 kernels each put up and about 50 or so kept out for more tests. Hopefully not too many more will accidentally fall on a hot skillet, as they are prone to do. 


 

[reed]

Dec 6, 2014 0:52:09 GMT -5 Carol Deppe said:

Dec 4, 2014 5:38:51 GMT -5 reed said:

I think that is what I will do. Plant this to increase my supply of it for the next year, it's most important to just try to do that because it is the only ear like this I'v seen. I'm thinking though that I can still get a head start on a possible landrace  by mixing in some others and detasseling them.

Fact is, from the photos it is obvious your special ear has a deep red pericarp. But I can't tell whether you have a white aleurone that has been stained reddish from the pericarp (which might be because of the soaking in hot water), or whether you actually have a lavender aleurone. Or both. I think the aleurone has been stained red from the pericarp, but can't tell whether it would have been white otherwise, or was lavender.  (The hot water soak was probably counterproductive and screwed up ability to determine aleurone color by staining it with pigment from the pericarp.)

I tried scratching off some pericarp but couldn't tell anything for sure about the aleurone. Then I tried filing and that might have worked except all five kernels I tried happened to be white endosperm so there was nothing underneath to contrast if the aleurone was white and not enough contrast with the pericarp if it wasn't. Then I parched one and where it cracked open I was able to remove enough pericarp to see definite pinkish red underneath. It might not be the same after heating but enough to see it wasn't white. Heating also, even though without water might still have stained the aleurone. 

Aleurone wouldn't necessarily be the same on all kernels anyway, unless the ear was also was homozygous for a particular color there?? Otherwise you couldn't have multi- color ears?? Having exhausted all options to determine aleurone color on this ear, I officially declare it irrelevant, at least for now.   

[reed]

I did some germ tests on both my Big and Small Red ears, on the first warm day I will take them out and spray them with roundup in hopes it kills them. Don't know what else to do as all testing labs I found want way too much money or way to big a sample or both. 



Big Red has the red pin and Little Red blue. Notice the odd color of the sprout in upper right. Carol Deppe said Big Red would not likely produce all big red ears. I wonder if that sprout color is indicative that that particular plant would. It is going to be great fun finding out. Both ears sprouted 100%.

On a related note this particular raccoon has by accepting free marshmallow treats agreed not to bother my corn this year - or ever.



Would make a nice hat I think, I wish I knew how to do that. 
   

[DarJones]

Don't worry, the one that got away called all their friends in for the wake.

[reed]

eeek!, looks like something from a Hitchcock movie.