Hi Kenya,

Corn needs a certain amount of space or it will grow smaller ears. Taken to an extreme, it will grow like the grass in your lawn. Most sweet corn fields are planted in 30 inch rows and at a population of 28000 plants per acre. For perspective, field corn is usually planted at 36000 on 30 inch rows.

That being said, I plant my sweet corn in 28 inch rows and 6 inches apart in the row. My corn produces a decent sized ear but nothing huge. You can also keep the ears bigger by taking off the suckers. They aren't likely to produce an ear anyway and just take up nutrients that woulda been used in the main stalk.

Kenya

I'm interested in whether someone here has successfully planted and harvested corn using the SF gardening spacing, too. Did you notice that the original spacing given was 1 per SF, and then it was changed later to 4 per SF? I do wonder about such close spacing but want to see if anyone's tried it and had it work well.

Six inches sounds good. The only thing I like to give 12 inches to are tomatoes and okra. I'm not against giving things space, but I like to maximize my space to the best extent possible. Thank you!!

Kenya

The link at the bottom has another GW discussion about the growing of corn using SF spacing. There's apparently a qualification -- only corn plants bred to be small (4 1/2 feet tall) should be planted this close, at 4 per 1 square foot.

I plant to grow this corn next summer, Legend, and it's 6 1/2 feet tall, so I guess I'll space them at 1 foot to be safe.

Here is a link that might be useful: Growing Corn

I usually sow seeds at 4 to 6 inches approx., not more than 6 inches.He{{gwi:90504}}re is the pic. from this year's garden.

The plants on left are at about 4 inch separation.As you move on right the distance between plants increases partly
because some seeds did not germinate.Kernels are of average size. Since plants are in single row I hand pollinate the silk.
Row near corn is that of sweet potatoes.

I planted mine about 8 inches in each direction from one another for an area about 5 feet wide and 14 feet long, with a 18 inch path down the center. Looked like this a little while back:
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I don't expect big ears or more than one ear per plant. Maybe next year I'll expand to 12 inches apart and compare ear size.

I have planted feild corn and sweet corn since 1950. 4 inches apart in the row and 29 to 30 inches. You need at least 4 rows for polination. Corn is a heavy nitrogen feeder. The size of the ear depends on the variety only.

Old time feild corn was called horse corn. Ears about a foot long and close to l pound each. Now varieties are about 1/2 pound each. That makes it easier for combine shelling.

I grow my Golden Bantam corn in "hills" (actually just circles) up my 4 foot wide permanent bed. I stagger the hills up the bed from one side to the other, the hills about 3 feet apart. In each 12 inch diameter hill I plant 6-8 kernals and thin to three, so within each hill plants are only a couple of inches apart. I always plant at least three hills at a time. I get excellent corn with this technique; no hand pollination needed. GB corn gets 6 feet tall.

I usually use 4-6 inches anything closer doesn't work out!!
The corn just doesn't grow as tall as the rest.
Tomatos I planted at 26" and its NOT enough I am in there all the time trying to keep air ways open they are so thick I cant walk in between and the air cant circulate.
The early blight came in and with the branches touching the blight is spreading horrible.I use Champ to TRY and help but it really doesn't.Champ is a copper base, hate the blue I have to scrub off tomatoes!!!