breeding a sweet corn line from dent & flint corn etc

[oakbloom]

Hi everyone,

My initial questions:

Starting with flint/flour/dent x sweet f1 then selecting from there: many generations should I expect to breed before I see a stable sweet line?

Of those types of corn would it be better if I started with flour over dent or popcorn etc?

Is it ok to breed different sweet types into a line in a grex type manner?

if not which sweet genetic type (su, sh2, se) should I go for first?

I know sweet corn have an issue with pollination from different types of corn. Besides what I am growing I am not in a corn growing area (urban so unintended pollination isn't a concern.

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My current breeding plan would be a series of F1 crosses of various lines
F2 is a selection period
F3 cross back into sweet corn and select again etc

I am not the best with breeding terminology (I haven't dealt with punett squares since that biology lesson in 4th grade) so forgive me and don't be afraid to ask me to explain more
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More information:

I've never grown corn before nor have I bred plants. I am a newbie point blank. However I've decided I want to start crossing my own lines. I am also planning on tomatoes this year.

Corn seems like a good place to start for a variety of reasons (ones which may be misassumptions on my part!!) - corn is easy to find lots of great heirlooms from, has a lot of genetic and growth information and seems easy to pollinate. 
So I've decided I'd like to try and breed my own sweet corn lines but I want to incorporate things like colors and kernel sizes seen from flour corns. Even if it isn't 'easy' in comparison to other common crops (feel free to tell me!) I've already invested in various seeds to get this show on this road.

I may ask this in this open source breeding forum.

[reed]

I think corn is a great place to start in plant breeding because by detasseling some plants to pollinate from others it is so easy to do. Also many traits will show up right away in the cross giving an instant gratification not often seen in other species.

Many of both flour and flint types make a fine sweet corn as is except that the window on when to harvest is very short, only a day or two when they are good but by mixing them with actual sweet types you can easily being in colors and other things you are looking for.

In my own similar work I focused used both SU and SE sweets but excluded the newer SH2 and other more recently available types. I suspect they are not as robust, especially as seedlings as the others are.

Another good thing in such a project is it doesn't matter all that much how you go about your crosses (unless you are looking for something specific) because any kernels with SU and or SE genes will show up as wrinkled after drying where the others won't.

[DarJones]

Generally the best results will come from a cross to a flint variety with dent and flour both bringing soft starch into the mix. Sweet corn normally produces a very small amount of soft starch as it affects the flavor quite a bit. The rest of your question re stabilizing a line is about 7 generations of careful selection after the initial cross. Usually by the 5th generation it will be stable enough for most uses. If you are trying to nail down a bunch of traits 7 generations works better.

[oakbloom]

Mar 29, 2021 10:11:44 GMT -5 reed said:

I think corn is a great place to start in plant breeding because by detasseling some plants to pollinate from others it is so easy to do. Also many traits will show up right away in the cross giving an instant gratification not often seen in other species.
[...]
Another good thing in such a project is it doesn't matter all that much how you go about your crosses (unless you are looking for something specific) because any kernels with SU and or SE genes will show up as wrinkled after drying where the others won't.

Thank you! This is great information and I'd forgotten about shrunken kernel bit.

[oakbloom]

Mar 29, 2021 18:51:06 GMT -5 DarJones said:

Generally the best results will come from a cross to a flint variety with dent and flour both bringing soft starch into the mix. Sweet corn normally produces a very small amount of soft starch as it affects the flavor quite a bit. The rest of your question re stabilizing a line is about 7 generations of careful selection after the initial cross. Usually by the 5th generation it will be stable enough for most uses. If you are trying to nail down a bunch of traits 7 generations works better.

So you're saying I should breed my dent/flour lines to a flint one and then use that to breed with a sweet line?

That good information, I'll have categorize the different types when I'm back home.

I think I mostly have dent and sweet (su/se via yukon chief and candy mountain and also sh2 via damaun).