Growing Corn in a Container

By Michaelle Scanlon and Deborah Lessne

Adapted from Garden sPOTS’ Corn Harvest Science Kit, which includes this guide, experiments, activities, seeds, planter, soil, and fertilizer.

Everyone loves summer sweet corn, but can you grow it in a small space, like a patio pot? Yes, you can! You always have to grow more than one plant to get edible ears (read on to find out about pollination), but even a few stalks in a container can produce a yummy treat if you know a few simple tricks.

Corn-Growing Supplies

• A 16- to 20-inch diameter plastic pot. Pot should be at least 14 inches deep and have drainage holes.

• Seed corn kernels (10 for 16-inch pot, 14 for 20 inches)

• Potting mix with added compost: 2 parts potting mix to 1 part compost

• Slow-release fertilizer (you may want to use organic fertilizer); read package carefully

• Water-soluble fertilizer (you may want to use organic fertilizer); read package carefully

• Small clippers or scissors

Planting Corn in a Pot

Make a note on the calendar on the day you plant. Count 10 days for when you should see your first sprouts. Then count 60 days from the planting date and put another note on the calendar for when you are going to start checking to see if the corn is ready to eat.

Fill your container with the potting mix and compost until about 4 inches from the top of the pot. Pat the mix down lightly in the pot as you fill it.

Read the instructions for your slowrelease fertilizer to determine the right amount for your planter. Sprinkle the slow-release fertilizer evenly over the top and gently mix into the top inch of potting mix. You can use a disposable spoon or wear gloves and use your fingers.

Finish filling the pot with potting mix.

With a ruler, measure 1-inch from the tip of your finger. Make a mark on your finger, so you know how far to push it into the soil to make a 1-inch-deep hole.

In a 20-inch pot of soil, make 14 holes in a circle pattern.

Your 1-inch deep holes should be in sets of two. In a smaller pot, use fewer sets of holes—a 16-inch pot should have 10 holes. The two holes in each set can be almost touching, but make sure that each set has space before the next group. Also, make sure the holes aren’t right up against the wall of the pot—each set of holes needs potting mix all the way around it. Once the sprouts get big, you are going to thin them.

Drop a kernel into each hole and gently fill all the holes with the remaining cup of soil. Pat down lightly all over the top of the pot.

Water the pot slowly and gently the first time to avoid pushing the soil around too much. Water until all the soil looks wet and some water runs out of the bottom of the pot. You will need at least a gallon of water to wet all the new potting mix.

Keep the pot outside in an area where it will get full sun. That means the sun has to shine directly on the pot for at least 6 hours every day.

Check on your pot each day. Make sure the soil in the pot stays damp until the sprouts emerge because the seeds need to stay moist until they sprout.

In seven to 10 days, the sprouts will push out of the soil. Keep checking your plants every day to see if they need water, but now change how you water. Corn will use lots of water, especially as it gets taller and the weather gets hotter, but let the soil surface dry between watering times.

After the plants have sprouted, check the pot each day by pushing your finger into the soil about a half inch down. If it is dry, give it a slow drink of water. If it still feels cool and moist, you can wait before you water again. Add about an inch of water over the whole surface of the pot. You may need to check the soil twice a day if the air temperature goes above 90 degrees. It’s best if you don’t water after 4 in the afternoon—you want the surface of the soil to have time to dry again before the sun goes down.

Next Corn Growing Steps

Not every kernel of corn is going to sprout. Usually only half to threequarters of the seeds will germinate. This is why you made a double set of holes for planting.

When your sprouts reach about 4–6 inches high, it is time to thin them. Wherever more than one seed sprouted in a set of two, carefully cut the smaller or weaker plant off right at the soil level. When you are done, the remaining plants should be about 6–8 inches away from each other and they will have lots of room to grow.

After you thin the plants, it’s time to give them some fertilizer. Read the instructions on your water-soluble fertilizer to determine the right amount for your planter. The next time you water, add the water-soluble fertilizer to a gallon of water. Stir to dissolve. Gently water all around the plants. Try not to get the fertilizer water on the leaves and stalks.

When the sprouts reach 10 inches tall, it is time to give them the next dose of fertilizer. Follow the same method as described above.

When you first see silks sprouting at the sides of the stalk (about 30 days after planting), add the last dose of fertilizer.

Pollinating Your Corn

Once the anthers (yellow-brown pollen structures hanging from the tassel) and silks appear, it is time to pollinate your plants. Out in a large field, the wind does a good job of spreading the pollen from the tassels to the silks on other plants, although often the stalks around the edges of a field don’t get fully pollinated. You have a tiny field in a pot, so you will have to give your plants a little help. Remember, every strand of silk has to get some pollen or there will be missing kernels on your cob.

You will pollinate your corn every day for about a week after the anthers and silks are fully out. Don’t try to gather all of the pollen in one day. The best time to gather pollen is in the morning, but not if is raining or the plants are wet.

Make sure your hands are clean and dry before starting or the pollen will stick to you. Use clean scissors to snip off one “arm” of a tassel. Be very gentle to avoid knocking off the pollen.

Use the tassel piece like a feather duster to sprinkle the pollen onto the silks of a different plant in the pot. You will do this all week, so don’t snip all the arms off at once.

Repeat with each plant. For best results, make sure each of the plants gets some pollen on its silks from a different plant. A good way to mix it up is to work your way around the pot by taking part of a tassel from one plant, go to the next plant to sprinkle the pollen on the silks, then snip a tassel from that plant and shake it on the silks of the next plant. Don’t forget the plant in the middle.

Remember: Do this every day for one week except on days it is raining. The silks turn brown after they are pollinated, so you will be able to see if most of the silks have been successfully pollinated.

Harvesting Your Corn

It takes 61–63 days after sprouting the seeds for your corn to be ready to eat for the variety we grow. (Check the seed package for days to maturity on the variety you choose.) This should be about three weeks after you pollinate the ears. If it has been very hot (over 90 degrees) during the month, the corn may be ready before then, but not much earlier.

Here are signs your corn is ready to harvest:

• Feel the ear through the husk. The top should feel full, firm, and rounded, not sharp and pointy.

• The silks are brown and dry, and have curled up. They break easily when touched.

• The final test is to peel open the top of the husk and check to see if the kernels are yellow, plump, and juicy—but don’t do this too early! Once the husk is open, it is easier for insects, birds, and other animals to sample the corn, too. Plus, if it rains, water gets into the ear and it might start to rot. If you do have to check inside, use a rubber band to close the husk again if the corn isn’t ready to harvest.

The ear that is highest on the stalk will ripen first. After you harvest that one, any lower ears may need another week or so to ripen.

Try to harvest corn in the morning before it gets hot. Sugars in the kernel turn to starch quickly in the heat.

It’s easy to harvest corn: Just bend the ear down so the silks are pointing at the ground, then twist and snap the ear off where it meets the stalk. If the stalk has more than one ear, be careful not to break the rest of the stalk when you harvest the first one. The smaller ears need some more time to ripen.

Store the fresh corn in the refrigerator until dinner time, but don’t keep it too long. The longer you keep it, the less sweet it will be. The best advice is to eat it the day you pick it.

Corn Tips and Fun Facts

• Many people think corn kernels are seeds. Each corn kernel is actually a fruit! Like any fruit, it has a protective coat, an area of starchy food, and genetic material ready to grow into a new plant (this is called the embryo). Corn is a special kind of fruit, also called a “grain,” that has its outer coating tightly fused to the edible starchy part.

• Corn kernels stay dormant (inactive) in the ground until the sun warms the soil to about 60°F. Corn shouldn’t be planted before the air temperature is sure to stay above 50°F because if the seed starts to sprout and then freezes, the new plant will die.

• Once the ground is warm, the kernel needs to soak up lots of water, so it can swell and split the seed coat to allow the embryo to grow (sprout). It takes 10 to 14 days for the seed to sprout.

• The sprout grows into a stalk with leaves and continues to grow. The type of corn grown on most farms is between 7 and 10 feet tall. Some kinds of corn can reach 15 feet tall! For this project, we recommend corn that has been developed for containers and will get about 4 to 5 feet tall, such as Burpee’s ‘On Deck’ variety.

• As your corn matures, it will develop some interesting growths at the bottom. These look like fat roots and, in fact, they are called brace roots. It is likely that they were given that name because it looks like they help support the corn stalk, but the truth is, no one really knows what they do for the corn plant.

• People aren’t the only ones who love corn. Squirrels may try to dig up the kernels before they sprout. You can keep some netting over the pot until you see the green sprouts, then take it off. Deer don’t generally eat corn stalks, but if you have lots of deer in your yard, they may try to taste the young sprouts, which will pull the plants out of the pot. Put the pot somewhere deer can’t reach (like on a deck) or place some tall sticks in the ground around the pot and lay protective netting over the top so it isn’t touching the young stalks.

After you pollinate the corn and the ears start to ripen, raccoons will be the biggest fans of the corn. If your yard is not a place they usually find food, though they may not even look for your corn.

• An ear of corn will always have an even number of rows. An average ear has 800 kernels in 16 rows.

• The plant we call “corn” is native to the Americas. Now, it is grown on every continent except Antarctica. The scientific name for corn is Zea mays mays comes from the Native American word for corn, which the Spanish settlers thought sounded like maize. In early Europe, the word “corn” meant any cereal grain (like wheat).

• Corn is an annual, which means it only grows for one season and dies after producing seeds. After harvest, the stalks will turn brown and can be removed from the pot or left in the pot to dry. When dry, corn stalks make great fall decorations (cut off the roots). When you are done with them, cut them into shorter pieces and put those in a compost pile. o

Michaelle Scanlon and Deborah Lessne are the co-owners of Garden sPOTS (www. garden-spots.com). Garden sPOTS delivers planters to Maryland and Virginia within 15 miles of Rockville, MD.

Leesburg Flower Fest

By Jessica Harden

Seas of people swarm North King Street and the smell of kettle corn fills the air as families pull carts of plants behind them. Everyone gathered in the small town in Loudoun County was celebrating the unofficial start of spring.

The 33rd annual Leesburg Flower and Garden Festival was held on April 15 and 16 in downtown Leesburg, VA, and had 119 retail vendors, 15 food vendors, nine sponsors, and tens of thousands of visitors, according to Linda Fountain, events and outreach manager.

“I think people always really look forward to it after a dreary winter.” Fountain said. “Now it’s April and things are starting to bloom, so we bring this event downtown and people just love to come out for it.”

The festival had live entertainment, a children’s area with events all day, festival food, and the People’s Choice Landscaping Competition that guests can vote on. Pine Ridge Landscaping won this year’s competition.

This year’s festival included live music from NOVA artist Hilary Veltri, a Tae Kwon Do demonstration at the Garden Patch for kids, and a rooftop beer garden.

“It’s a fun family event, not just for people who are gardeners,” Fountain said. “We’ve got great entertainment, we’ve got festival food, we’ve got the Garden Patch with kid’s activities.”

The Flower and Garden Festival dates back to 1990 and has an average of 30,000 visitors throughout the weekend. The festival takes place during the third weekend of April, unless that is Easter weekend.

The festival’s vendors are anyone from plant sellers, garden suppliers, soap and candle companies, and food trucks selling hot funnel cakes.

“There’s something for everyone,” Fountain said. “And it’s in such a cool little town.” o

Jessica Harden is a junior journalism major minoring in law and society, with a concentration in criminal law, at the University of Maryland, College Park, MD. She is an intern this semester with Washington Gardener and is from San Antonio, TX.

Cherry Tree Symposium at US National Arboretum

By Kathy Jentz

On Saturday, March 18, the U.S. National Arboretum (USNA) hosted the Connecting Cultures: Japanese Flowering Cherries in America Symposium.

Since the mid-19th century, appreciation of Japanese flowering cherries has been growing in the United States, melding Japanese aesthetics and techniques with a distinctly American flair. Today, the USNA stands as a center of American appreciation for Japanese flowering cherry trees, growing about 60 cultivars. The oldest flowering cherry trees on the USNA’s grounds were planted in the early 1950s, and these aging trees provide an opportunity to experiment with a traditional Japanese method of tree rejuvenation.

Japanese expert Kurato Fujimoto worked with USNA staff for the week preceding this symposium to install traditional-style wooden crutches to support the heavy branches of two old weeping cherry trees. These beautiful and functional supports are now in place and are visible for any visitor to the USNA grounds to examine them.

The program covered the history of Japanese cherry trees in America, ancient cherry trees and restorative practices in Japan, the flowering cherry research program at the Arboretum, and a tree-side presentation of the traditional Japanese support system.

After the program, an evening reception in the National Bonsai & Penjing Museum featured the opening of the exhibit “Sakura Orihon: Diary of a Cherry Blossom Journey.” Landscape architect Ron Henderson recorded his experience in folding sketchbooks called orihon. Henderson personally led attendees through the exhibit to explain the drawings. His work celebrates the cherry blossom culture in Japan, highlighting his pilgrimages to visit famous old trees (some over 1,500 years old!). He also focuses on the horticultural practices that extend the lives of cherry trees in Japan. o

Kathy Jentz is the editor and founder of Washington Gardener

The Urban Garden: 101 Ways to Grow Food and Beauty in the City is all about small-space gardening solutions!

By Kathy Jentz and Teresa

Speight

Published by Cool Springs Press/Quarto Homes

Order it today at: https://amzn.to/3yiLPKU

GardenDC Podcast

The GardenDC podcast is all about gardening in the greater Washington, DC, and Mid-Atlantic area. The program is hosted by Kathy Jentz, editor of Washington Gardener Magazine, and features guest experts in local and national horticulture. The latest episodes include interviews with experts on Hydrangea Care, Growing Berries, and Native Plants. You can listen online at https:// washingtongardener.blogspot.com/ or on Spotify, Apple, etc. o

From Seed to Bloom: A Year of Growing and Designing with Seasonal Flowers

Author: Milli Proust

Publisher: Hardie Grant/Quadrille

List Price: $29.99

Order Links: https://amzn.to/45qTUib and https://bookshop.org/ a/79479/9781787137349

Reviewer: Jessica Harden

From Seed to Bloom is the perfect book for anyone looking to get started with plant growing and designing. The author even starts out by saying she’s just a beginner, she’s only been doing this for five years, and these are the tips and tricks she’s learned from her own experiences.

The book is split into eight seasons: late winter, early spring, late spring, early summer, late summer, early autumn, late autumn, and early winter. Because the author uses a mix of common and botanical names, there’s an index in the back to help readers match a plant’s common and botanical name.

The book starts with tips on where to find flowers, then how to grow your own in a container and in the ground. It also includes how to plan and prepare the growing space, feed and care for the plants, save seeds, and harvest the flowers.

The author then goes into detail about designing with plants. She talks about color theory, vases, bouquets, and the principles of designing with flowers.

This book is well-rounded and covers all of the bases for growing and designing with flowers year-round. o

Jessica Harden is a junior journalism major minoring in law and society, with a concentration in criminal law, at the University of Maryland, College Park, MD. She is an intern this semester with Washington Gardener and is from San Antonio, TX.

The Home-Scale Forest Garden: How to Plan, Plant, and Tend a Resilient Edible Landscape

Author: Dani Baker

Publisher: Chelsea Green Publishing

List Price: $34.95

Order Link: https://amzn.to/3WtDvW9 and https://bookshop.org/ a/79479/9781645020981

Reviewer: Andrea F. Siegel

The Home-Scale Forest Garden is not another how-to book about growing the best veggies in the hot summer sun. It is a guide to creating an edible landscape designed to be like nature’s forests. From treetops to groundcovers and multiple layers in between, a forest garden is an ecosystem that regenerates organically and grows food for the gardeners.

The author exudes excitement about what she calls her “forest garden adventure.” She acknowledges that before starting this journey, she hadn’t heard of honeyberries, but now they’re among her most-loved fruits.

A retired psychologist who has a farm in northern New York with her partner, Baker is a self-taught gardener. She shares her knowledge and experiences in this nicely illustrated book.

She explains how she designed and created what began as a half-acre forest garden with multiple layers featuring plants that provide food, are nitrogen-fixing, benefit wildlife, are attractive, and so on. As in a natural forest, decaying plant debris forms humus that holds moisture and nutrients to keep feeding its plants. Meanwhile, it sequesters carbon.

Baker joyfully takes readers through planning and building this garden, including such topics as pest deterrence and good growing practices.

Baker shows how even a 25-squarefoot area can feature a graceful honey locust tree for its overstory or top layer, with a fruit tree as its understory, and plants such as berry bushes, and even edible daylilies below.

Unlike the annuals in most sunny summer vegetable gardens, the forest garden is composed almost entirely of perennials, although they need TLC to get established. In time, it requires less tending by gardeners as nature steps in. Still, the stewardship appendix shows there is plenty of work for the forest gardener year-round. As a startup, the forest garden also requires a greater initial financial investment than annuals do.

Baker regales readers with personal stories of lessons learned, from plants that exceeded expectations to those that needed less wind, more sun, a higher/drier location, a wetter site, and the like.

The book has three sections. First, in the planning and planting section, she advises boots on the ground for studying and mapping the site—where water naturally ponds and the track of the sun, for example—so gardeners know what they’re working with. Creating planting mounds and paths is included in this work.

What follows is the plants section, covering many of the plants in Baker’s garden at each level of the permaculture, starting with tall trees—including nut trees—and working down to root plants. Necessary information accompanies each plant, plus her observations. She also provides the native range. (Many of the plants are not native, and I wish Baker had included native alternatives to non-natives and some specific plant-pollinator relationships.)

The third section discusses plant groupings. The plan drawings here are most helpful. Groupings are a key part of garden design, and in Baker’s book, they take on another role: encouragement. Few gardeners with urban and suburban lots have a half-acre to start a forest garden, but they may have space to adapt a grouping to a property.

The amount of information in Baker’s book makes it a good resource in general, as well as for those thinking of having any size edible forest. o

Andrea Siegel is a master gardener in Maryland.

Prairie Up: An Introduction to Natural Garden Design

Author: Benjamin Vogt

Publisher: University of Illinois Press

Order link: https://amzn.to/3WwTT8a and https://bookshop.org/ a/79479/9780252086779

Cost: $29.95

Reviewer: Marsha Douma

Since I am slowly “naturalizing” more and more of my own lawn and garden, I found Prairie Up to be a timely and valuable how-to book. Author Benjamin Vogt, in easy-to-read text with clear charts, diagrams, and beautiful photographs, explains how the everyday gardener can efficiently as well as cost effectively create a mini-meadow, to have both an ecologically meaningful and beautiful garden.

The Great Plains of North America, which support some 5,000 species of plants, including grasses that can grow 7 feet high with roots almost as deep, must have been a sight to behold when they were intact. The plants that evolved on the prairie developed root systems to thrive in a layer of soil other plants were not using to maximize finding the water they needed, and space and root forms for anchorage and stability. The plant parts above the ground are designed to bend with the wind, rarely getting so tall that they fall over because the plants all support each other.

The flowers are varied and beautiful since they had to compete with so many others.

All these features assured a plant’s survival and created so much diversity.

Importantly, the deep roots protected the land, holding the soil in place and preventing erosion during floods, drought, extreme heat, cold, ice, and snow. As the Earth’s climate becomes increasingly unpredictable, we can certainly benefit from growing these useful plants in our own gardens, as well as in vulnerable areas.

The author, of course, understands that the great prairies will not be recreated by planting bluestems, coneflowers, bee balm, milkweed, and goldenrod in our gardens.

But in our cities and suburbs, if more and more lawns and available fields and strips of land alongside the roads could be reimagined and repurposed as meadows, these plants can at least do some good as they regain their essential role in the natural world by providing nectar to pollinators, and essential habitat and food for birds, small mammals, invertebrates, and amphibians.

It was not that long ago that an essential part of filling the car with gas was to clean all the insects off the windshield. No longer they simply don’t have a place to live and thrive anymore, so many have vanished. And as the insects decline at the alarming rate of about 2% per year, so do all the species dependent on them for food.

If benefiting the natural world is not your garden priority, another good reason to transform at least some of your lawn into a mini-meadow is that once a meadow garden is established, it will require much less maintenance, such as watering and weeding, as long as the plant selection is appropriate for the site.

So much for the why, what about the how. The majority of the book is devoted to detailed plans for how to get a site ready; plant lists to use in different circumstances with some sample plans; and options for accomplishing this transformation using seed, plugs, and larger plants. The author even includes a section to help homeowners explain these gardens to their HOAs—a meadow can look messy if one is used to a traditional mown lawn.

An important major difference in a “natural garden” compared to a traditional garden is in a managed landscape—the individual plants and their placement are the main focus of the garden. That, in fact, is what traditional garden design does—use a plant’s inflorescence, blooming times, leaf characteristics, and overall size and shape, etc. to create a living picture. Plants have enough room to “grow” because the goal is to keep them in their designated place, since they serve a role in the overall design. With native plants in a meadow-type setting, the selection is largely made according to how useful a plant is, how aggressive it is compared to the other plants being chosen, and whether the new meadow is right out front or more hidden, because it is a very different look. In a meadow, as in a prairie, the plants are packed in tightly—eventually, there is no mulch.

Certainly, for a new meadow, the plants and their placement are carefully chosen. However, the final arrangement of plants as the garden matures will be determined by the plants themselves, as they compete for the resources of their location. The plants will fill in empty spaces as they do in nature, creating a natural design.

This is a marvelous book for the converted—those ready to “prairie up” and transform at least part of their own landscape into a more natural state. It is not a book for those undecided about how or even if they want to prioritize using native plants in their gardens. For this latter purpose, Vogt’s first book, A New Garden Ethic is an excellent read. o