Thanks Dawn,

I still am confused as to when to plant. The guide from the Tulsa late planting dates calendar says last week of June to the first week of July. If I understand you correctly the later the better as long as I have the required number of days until frost which is Oct 15 for here.

Thanks for your time,

Janyce

You're welcome.

Yes, later is better, especially in a hot year. The worst possible thing that can happen with sweet corn planted for a fall harvest is that it will start pollinating while temperatures are still hot enough to impede fertilization. When that happens, you don't get any corn to eat. The hard part about this process is that we have no idea how hot August will be, for example, so we're always just guessing and planting and crossing our fingers and hoping it all works out. There are, unfortunately, no gurantees in gardening. Good luck with your sweet corn and I hope you get a nice harvest.

I just harvested 91 ears from my spring-planted corn this morning, so we'll be eating a lot of corn for a while, and I'll be freezing the rest. While 91 ears may sound like a lot, my husband loves fresh sweet corn and can eat several ears with our dinner every night, so it won't last as long as one might think it will.

I do understand that. Reasor's grocery close to us had some non-GMO corn last week (which is hard to find around here). I bought 2 dozen ears and Jim wants it every night. I'll give the corn a try and definitely plan on spring corn nest year.

Have a great week and thanks again.

Janyce

We just planted our meal corn last Monday, about two weeks later than most years. But our cabbage was late this year and was still in the ground where the corn was going in until last Friday. I hope we get some decent corn for cornmeal this winter.

I think that meal corn is more heat tolerant than sweet corn. Or, at least in my garden both meal corn and field corn have been more heat tolerant, especially the really old open-pollinated varieties.

A member of Gerge's Seed Savers group gave us the seed. It is yellow dent. I think that is OP.

Our corn is jumping up. Also, we just got our pumpkins planted right before the rain.

Rain? You got rain? I am totally jealous.

I just finished harvesting the last of our sweet corn and now will let the heat burn up the plants. It is in the back garden and I may chop up the stalks and leave them on the ground to decompose. It is too dry here to plant a succession crop back there to follow the sweet corn. We haven't had rain at our house since either June 2nd or 3rd, and things are getting really dry. And fiery. We haven't had any coons after the corn either. That makes it a really odd year.

Dawn,

You could plant PEPH peas. They love the heat.

Johnny

I have six varieties of PEPH in the front garden and they all are producing heavily. I'm afraid if I plant any more, I'll be shelling peas all day every day in July and August. I'm probably going to leave the back fallow, or maybe plant a quick cover crop of something after I harvest the garlic and figs back there. This is looking like a summer which will require irrigation and I don't want to water the back. Well, I don't want to water the front garden either, but I guess I will, at least for a while.

The front garden is legume heavy this year. I had snap peas and bush beans that produced well and now are gone, and then there's the pole beans that are producing heavily now, and the lima beans that are flowering but not producing beans (I hope the heat isn't impeding them but fear it may be) and the six varieties of southern peas that are supposed to be bush types. Well, as usual with southern peas, the line between bush varieties and pole varieties is slim. If they can find something to climb they will. I have some bush varieties that have put out runners that have run or climbed at least 5 feet and they're still growing. They're making tons of peas though, so I am not complaining.

The poor old back garden surely must feel neglected, but there's just not enough hours in the day. I'm thinking of turning it into an orchard/fruit garden next year and just leaving one open area where I can alternate sweet corn and southern peas or maybe winter squash.

I canned all day today, again, and miss being out in the garden. Tomorrow I'm going to go out and at least get the harvesting done before I settle down indoors for another day of processing the harvest. I'm not complaining. It is a blessing to have so much food to put up or future meals, but I sure am stuck in a canning rut.