Neandercorn

[keen101 (Biolumo / Andrew B.)]

I was thinking 2.5-3. I wonder if there is variation in it or whether it respond differently to drought/stress because the second time i tried growing it it was mostly flat and curly low to the ground, but it was not getting enough fertilizer or water that year.

I seem to remember when mine tasseled late that only the main stalk tasseled and it broke off from an animal that thought it was corn. But i could be confusing that experience with Zea luxurians or Zea parviglumis.

If you can i would start covering it now, but that's just me.

Maybe for the big clump you can duct tape some cut up garbage bags together?

[reed]

It has been quite hot here and I confess, I'v been watering it. It seems very happy. I read back in another thread that it only takes 12 days so I'm gonna go ahead and start covering the individual stalk that I transplanted and see what happens. That stalk is the fattest but is a little shorter than the rest, it fits easily under the cardboard box I have ready for the purpose.

I worry a little that in the hot sun of late afternoon it might cook inside a sealed cover, is that an issue to consider?

[walt]

At the Land, we covered them at 5:00 PM as we left work.  In the morning we uncovered them at 8:00 or as late as 9:00 AM when we arrived at work.  They were planted between the parking lot and the office.
They were uncovered during the heat of the day.
Once flowering is started, they would keep going for a while, but we kept them on short days this way all summer, once they were established in their summer quarters.
Winters, they lived in 5 gallon buckets in the greenhouse.  American gallons, of course.  Though I think British or Canadian 5 gallons would have been OK.
We found Z. diploperennis needed lots of water.  No suprize, as it is native to cloud forest.

[reed]

I have been real negligent on covering, by box blew away, the Z dip plant and have not as of yet had any flowering. However I think it may be about ready to flower on it's own, at least it is growing little leafy structures pretty high up on the stalks. Shanks? Ears? Can't tell yet.

The individual stalk that I severed from the clump is about 3 and 1/2 feet tall and basically just looks like a small corn plant. The main clump is easily over 4' tall and also is getting the leafy structures. It takes up about 1 sq foot at the base with all its stems and spreads over a much larger area at the crown.

I had issue with lodging on two different occasions recently but NONE of the sweet neandercorn plants did that. Neandercorn also did not have any lodging last year. In the sweet corn patch several other very tall plants did not lodge at all. Those plants and the the sweet neander tasseled in unison and the sweet neandercorn was detasseled and pollinated with mostly those plants although other pollen no doubt sneaked in.

Those larger plants all have at least two ears well off the ground and so do all the sweet neandercorn plants. I think they should make a real nice foundation to go on with. The rest of the patch will be harvested and eaten soon. I'll dig up all the seed plants and put them in a big tub on the patio to free up space and protect them from critters.

I also collected a big bunch of sweet pollen today. I put some rice in the oven and then let it cool almost to room temp and put it in a jar with the pollen. I let it set for just a few minutes open then sealed it up and put it in the freezer. No clue if that will work, just trying to have a little more chance in case the other plants planted at various times don't coincide with the Z dip.

Side stalks of the sweet neandercorn are in various stages of blooming now too. Silks are already drying on the first ears so I'm leaving the secondary flowers alone. That continued till frost last year so If nothing else I should have some of that pollen for the Z dip plant.
If that is how it turns out I will have Z dip x ( (something and something) x Z dip) instead of Z dip x sweet. That would be fine as I'll still have hybrid seeds with Z dip as mother to work with next year. 

[walt]

The only way I've read of storing Zea pollen in freezing it in acetone.  Grass pollen in general doesn't store dry.  But it doesn't hurt to try.
I only had success hand pollinating corn was with pollen an hour or less old.
Wheat and rye pollen lasts only about 5 min. on a hot dry day.

[paddymc]

The first corn to start tasseling in my garden this year - Neandercorn x Sweet. Which is great, because there's a few others on the
verge that I want to pollinate it with.





The Neandercorn are the slightly shorter plants in the center left of the second photo.

[reed]

paddymc , How tall are the sweet neandercorn plants? They look quite short. Most of mine are 8' and more. Interesting how differently plants grow in different environments. The unexpected trait of resistance to lodging is another great plus in my area. One plant has purplish streaks up and down the stalk and dark pink silks. Don't know that there is any advantage to that expect it's pretty. 

I detasseled the primary plants and crossed with the sweets, those ears are starting to mature. I'm going to let the secondary tassels make pollen and self the sweet neander plants as insurance not to lose too much of the multi-stalk, multi-ear growth habit. I don't know what % of Z dip is still in these plants but am already noticing variation in number of strong "tillers" for lack of a better word.  All plants are making multiple new silks along the same shanks of the original larger ears plus growing newer ones lower down. 

Sure hope I'm able to get some new F1 seed with the pure Z dip plant as the mother. 

[paddymc]

There's quite a bit of variation in the height of my Neandercorn x Sweet Plants. But none of them are among the tallest corn plants in my garden. They are (except for two) quite "bushy" with tillers coming out all over the place. You're a few weeks of growth ahead of me, but I'll keep reporting back as as the season goes on. Multi stalk/multi ear is also what I'm hoping for, and if it appears, those genes will be significantly represented in my own breeding project. I'm super excited for the results of your Z.Dip x Sweet experiment, both for the perrenial sweet corn potential and to see if covering plants to induce flowering can be made to work (I've got some South American seeds I'm holding on to to try that with next year.

[reed]

Most of my sweet neandercorn plants so far look more like a normal corn stalk without many tillers and they are pretty tall. First ears are close to ready with silks drying down. There are small mostly small tillers and a couple with secondary tassels. Also lots of new shanks or ears and new silks along the stalks. Will be fun to see what they do after the first large ears are removed and the other sweet corn that is currently competing for light is gone. We had fresh corn yesterday for lunch so won't be long till the sweet neandercorn has the patch to itself. Haven't seen any tassel ears so far.

I haven't done a good job of controlling light on the Z dip pant and haven't had any flowering, but I'm thinking it may do it on it's own pretty soon frmm the looks of it. It is huge now, at least five feet tall and very spreading. I tied it up to keep the stalks from flopping over. I can tell it really wants to do that cause they all have lots of roots shooting out on the base of the stems just waiting to touch the ground.

Got several more small patches planted and planted a small patch yesterday so hopeful something will be flowering when the Z dip does. After the rest of the patch is harvested in a few more days I may build some kind of frame over it so I can cover it with old bed sheets or something to see if I can induce flowering.

I think the F1 with Z dip mother is the most important first step so I will use sweet, flour or the later tassels of the sweet neandercorn, whatever is available.

[reed]

Calling for rain over next few days and I though the Sweet Neandercorn was mature enough and didn't want it to get wet so I went ahead and picked the first ear from all the earlier maturing plants. Little surprised at the less than Neandercorn appearance.


All the ears with shucks attached are the sweet Neandercorn ears. The plants were detasseled and I used the plants that made the four bottom ears as the primary pollen donors. I used those plants in my hand pollination cause they had multiple high up ears and cause they, as well as the Neandercorn had excellent resistance to lodging. I plucked and ate just a few kernels from each and they all tasted pretty good despite being well past milk stage. I'm leaving the Neandercorn plants to see if they make more ears and tassels now that the large primary ears are removed, and if it rains. 

The Z dip plant is now very close to six feet tall with a dozen or more large stalks and numerous smaller ones. It's stalks are very strong, a little bamboo like but weak at the bottom. That along with all the roots sticking out as much as a foot off the ground tell me it wants to fall over and spread but I have it tied up to a post to prevent that. Lots and lots of side branching or shanks or whatever they are up and down the stalks but no sign of flowering. Next little patch of sweet corn will be flowering in another couple weeks or so, if i'm gonna build a structure I can drape blankets or something over to block light I better get to it. On the other hand I have still later planted patches and still plenty of season. So, I may take the lazy route and gamble it will flower on its own. That pollen I put in the freezer is still nice and powdery, alive or not, I don't know. 

I love, love, love the strong stalks and the early maturity of the Neandercorn. The grandmother Nenadercorn plants from last year were hand pollinated by a collection of colorful flour and flint corns which is where the red ones must have come from. I had said I didn't what the Neandercorn in my flour patch but now I'm in hopes some of these kernels are not wrinkled when they dry. 

[steev]

Sounds like the Z dip would like to be hilled up.

[reed]

Jul 20, 2018 18:51:55 GMT -5 steev said:

Sounds like the Z dip would like to be hilled up.

Ah, I never thought of that, I might throw a little dirt around the base, give some of those root sprouts something to hold on too. I still think it really wants to fall over, root down and instantly expand the real estate it occupies 10 fold. I can imagine each of the big stalks rooting down and standing back up to start the whole process over in a circle around the old center.

Its growing right against a path so that side has to stay tied up but the other side is currently empty, having removed the stalks of the first sweet corn patch. I did think about releasing the stalks on that side to do what they want but if I do it will make it even more difficult to build a light control structure to induce flowering. On the other hand it would be fun to see and I do have the other smaller clone that I severed off the main plant awhile back. 

It might be kind of a good thing in a way that it it isn't hardy. I don't think it spreads quite as aggressively under the ground as Johnson Grass but it seems to have some of the same "I want it all" tendencies. 

[Joseph Lofthouse]

Jul 21, 2018 3:37:36 GMT -5 reed said:

It might be kind of a good thing in a way that it it isn't hardy. I don't think it spreads quite as aggressively under the ground as Johnson Grass but it seems to have some of the same "I want it all" tendencies. 

Not winter hardy in USDA zone 4b... All bets are off in warmer climates. Bwah, ha, ha!!!!

I had a plant overwinter in my root-pit. Which is basically an 18" hole in the ground, covered with dirt.

[paddymc]

Sweet Neandercorn is an ear production machine! There's even ears sprouting out of other ears.

[paddymc]

Neandercorn results. A really wide range from very "primitive" looking ears, to very modern. I like the plant structure and vigor a lot, so it's getting incorporated into my sweet corn project.