How far apart should I be spacing my corn?

[MsLucy]

How far apart should I be spacing my corn? last year I guess I put them to close together. I had all types of problems. Some stalks didn't mature as well or as fast as the others. Most of them, when I stripped them open were almost half way burned.

 

[Chuck]

How far apart should I be spacing my corn? last year I guess I put them to close together. I had all types of problems. Some stalks didn't mature as well or as fast as the others. Most of them, when I stripped them open were almost half way burned.

If planting your seeds in a single line about 8 inches apart. If you have wide rows and plant multiple lines of seed about 1 foot apart. Your actual rows should be about 2 feet apart. Corn is wind pollinated so each plant should be close enough for the tassels of one plant to fall onto the silks of another plant.

 

[headfullofbees]

I plant mine a foot apart each way, in blocks, and in the middle of each 4, I plant a bean.

 

[Chuck]

I plant mine a foot apart each way, in blocks, and in the middle of each 4, I plant a bean.

I have drip irrigation and I plant 4 in a 1 ft circle every 2 feet where I have an emitter. They all end up being 1 ft apart

 

[RamblingChicken]

Last time I planted corn, I planted it 18 inches apart, but that was to get away with less watering (not dryfarm spacing, but the same principle) and to make it really really easy to hoe in between. But it seemed pretty happy with the extra space.

 

[ChrisL]

I space my corn 18" apart and rows 2 ft apart. In regards to your plants not maturing as well or at the same time, I have the same issues no matter what variety of corn I plant. I simply pick the ears as they fill out. Never had a "burnt" problem, but if not picked quickly enough after the ears fill out, they rot easily here in south florida. Also, yellow varieties have a problem with some type of worm/maggot down here; I forget what they're actually called.

 

[Autumn_Hearthwitch]

I agree with the above, about 18 inches apart should do it and definitely pick them when the ear is filled out or it'll rot. I haven't had any problems with worms/maggots with the yellow varieties here in Eastern Canada. Or I should say I haven't had any problems the previous years. We've since moved to a new house so we'll see what happens this year. I prefer the bicolor varieties of corn though and only planted yellow once I believe. Corn on the cob has to be my favorite part of summer.

 

[headfullofbees]

Last time I planted corn, I planted it 18 inches apart, but that was to get away with less watering (not dryfarm spacing, but the same principle) and to make it really really easy to hoe in between. But it seemed pretty happy with the extra space.

If you grow "three sisters", the cucurbits' leaves will help keep watering down.

 

[marlingardener]

Chrisl, the worm/maggot is called a corn earworm. We have dealt with them also. One preventive measure is to put two or three drops of a vegetable oil on the ears as soon as they start to tassel. I don't know why it works, but it works!
Of course it is a pain if you have a lot of sweet corn, but since we have only two blocks of four rows, I spend a happy hour or two getting sliced by corn leaves and fighting my way through a "corn jungle" to do the veggie oil treatment.
The things folks to through for an ear of "roastin' corn"!

 

[Chuck]

I must be missing something here. I too have very limited water which is why I have drip irrigation, but for the life of me I cannot see the benefits of spacing corn at 18" when one can water 4 plants about 1' apart, instead of one plant every 1 1/2 ft for the same amount of water. I water 4 plants with each drip emmiter and each emmiter is 2' apart which means each plant is about 1' apart which means I can water 8 plants every 24" while if planted 18" you will water 2 plants for every 36" for about the same amount of water. Not only does this save water but look at the increased production, plus you will get much better pollination with no blank areas on the cob. My emmiters are rated at 1/2gph and it takes about 4 hours for a good soaking, so that means about 1/2 gallon per plant. One doesn't need a drip system to do this. Just rake up soil into a circle about 16" in diameter, plant your seeds at 12,3,6 and 9 oclock and water with a bucket or hose

 

[RamblingChicken]

I must be missing something here. I too have very limited water which is why I have drip irrigation, but for the life of me I cannot see the benefits of spacing corn at 18" when one can water 4 plants about 1' apart, instead of one plant every 1 1/2 ft for the same amount of water.[

Dryfarming is based on the principle of using the stored winter water in the soil. So it's not about how much space you must water, but how large an underground water bank the plant has to draw water from. The plants are planted at a much wider spacing than usual, and weeds are rigorously eliminated, because the presence of water-stealing weeds would eliminate the value of that wide spacing. It only works with some cultivars of some crops.

Edited to add: This of course assumes a wet winter and dry summer, which describes my climate. Though in theory that wide spacing should increase the drought tolerance of plants in areas with some summer rain, as well.

I'm playing with dryfarming on a very small scale. Last year, Early Girl tomatoes (6 foot by 6 foot spacing, and very deep planting of very tall seedling) produced well after just a good soaking when I planted the seedlings, and one unexpected rain a couple of weeks later. Costata Romanesco zucchini (same spacing) did well with, as I recall, no artificial watering at all--it got that one rain, and that was all.

Orange Rave pumpkins were well on their way to producing (one large pumpkin halfway to orange) after just a couple of cups of water to get the seeds started, but then their neighbors looked droopy on a hot day and I panicked and started watering the whole pumpkin patch. This year I'll grow both irrigated and dryfarmed pumpkins, so that I have a proper test of the dryfarming.

The dryfarm spacing that I see for corn, now that I look it up, is potentially three feet in both directions for my climate. It would be entertaining to test that, but not entertaining enough for me to use that much space, at least this year. I doubt that the traditional minimum 4 X 4 block would pollinate itself at such a distant spacing, even if I were willing to give it almost 150 square feet. I'm thinking that I'd want, oh, 20 X 20, maybe? Which would be...yeah. 3600 square feet. More than my entire garden.