I'm not aware of any Maize growing for human consumption in the UK, apart from the notable exception of Sweetcorn.
My own maize now crops around 600grams per square metre, which compares very favourably to the around 300g/m I get from Wheat or Rye. This is hardly surprising, not least of all because Wheat and Rye stop growing before our best Summer weather!
I originally got interested in Maize as a potential filler for the potato gap, that period of the year when last season's spuds are gone and this season's have yet to come in. Some years down the track, Maize forms a much larger part of the household diet, partly because my (Brazilian born) wife objects to potatoes more than three times a week!
At first most Maize was consumed 'whole grain', tho' a little was dry ground to flour. Now most of it is prepared with ash and wet ground. Our woodburning stove, which is only fed untreated wood, provides the ash.
In following posts I'll detail some of the Maize experiments I've conducted over the last two decades.
I first become aware of the potential of Maize in 2002, on a climbing trip to the Italian Dolomites. Polenta was sold in some of the mountain huts as a basic foodstuff. I had no prior knowledge of any European Maize growing, but reasoned that if they can do it in the Alps, I probably can.
At that time the only Maize seed available in the UK was a Hopi Blue, apart from countless number of Sweetcorns! I guess the Hopi was sold as a novelty/decorative Maize. I tried it for a few years. I also tried crossing it with one of the many dwarf early sweetcorns available, discovering that selecting against sweetcorn was very easy on the cob!
Hopi and its offspring proved to be fairly unreliable in my climate. I probably gave up on 'pure' Hopi around 2007, and Hopi hybrids in 2012. Hopis were dropped, partly because I only have two isolated growing spaces so I have to choose the most promising lines to work on. The other reason for dropping 'blues' was that eating home grown maize was somewhat outside most people's culinary experience and struggled against what one might call palate conservatism! I reckoned that the tendency of blues to look grey on a plate didn't improve its chance of acceptance, so I decided to focus on yellow maizes.
The next Maize venture started when talking to a friend of mine who had been brought up on the German speaking side of the Alps. She told me about Ribelmais. I had seen maize growing in the Rhine valley, but I had assumed it was cattle fodder! My friend's mother provided me with a packet of Ribelmais. (I think it had probably been sold for home grinding rather than home growing!)
In its first year the Ribelmais didn't ripen very well, however comparison with my Hopi cobs showed it definitely had promise! Fortunately I had some de-tasseled dwarf early sweetcorn in the Ribelmais patch and the following year, (2007), growing the F1, I had my first decent crop of maize!
Initially I started selecting for the original Ribelmais colour, a sort of ivory white, but after a couple of years I decided to select for yellow instead. It has taken ages to eliminate the sweetcorn gene. This is partly my 'fault' as I choose to plant seed from the previous three years. I like the mixed yellow cobs so probably won't select further on colour.
I sow the seed in an unheated greenhouse in mid April and plant it out about 6 weeks later, burying the seedlings roughly 10cm deeper than they were in the pots. I plant out at 6.25pm. The final height is about 1.8m tall. Harvest starts as the cobs dry, usually about mid September. (The cobs always require supplementary drying.) I guess that makes it a 180 day variety? Which makes me interested in what I read on here about 90 day varieties!!
I'm very happy with this maize, which I call 'Swiss'. It comfortably fills the 'Potato Gap' and regularly shows up on our plates, in various guises, throughout the year. Sadly, it doesn't make good Polenta! I guess because it doesn't have a high enough proportion of Flint starch.
The two 'bottle necks' with this crop are 1) the amount of time required to plant seedlings double deep, and 2) the space/time requirements to properly dry the cobs.
The two most significant potential problems I've encountered are 1) Wind rock (hence the double deep planting) 2) Greenfly infestation of the cobs. The greenfly residue encourages mould growth. I wash badly affected cobs prior to final drying.
This year the yield was 650gpm (not counting the scraps which get fed to the chickens). The 100 seed count of this year's selected mother cobs is 42g.
My next maize line started as a hunch. ... Some sweetcorn varieties come with a warning that they must not be planted near other varieties. ... My understanding of sweetcorn is that it is basically a genetically 'sick' maize, which is unable to convert sugar into starch. A step in the sugar-to-starch pathway is missing. SO presumably incompatible sweetcorn cultivars have different steps missing. Growing them together might produce starchy seeds. A disaster in sweetcorn, but just what I want!
I chose two dwarf (about 1.5m) early sweetcorns and planted them together. The resulting cobs showed some starchy seeds!
Discussing this within the family I was warned that the dwarfism in the two parental lines might also be differently mediated. So the same mechanism I had used to overcome 'sweetcorn' might create trouble with large plants. This proved to be slightly true, but a more persistent problem was double dwarfs!
In a standing population of dwarf plants, I could not work out a way of selecting for one dwarf and against the other! Eventually I decided to select just one cob to take the line forward on the thought that doing so would guarantee that one of the dwarfisms would then be massively more prevalent in the future population. Any pollen on the selected cob carrying the other dwarfism would now be easy to select against by de-tasseling any future double dwarfs.
I have very few pictures of this line. (It's not as pretty as the 'Swiss' line!) The cobs are slightly harder to dry. The seeds have a matt skin. The hundred seed weight is about 26g. I finally came to the conclusion that. ... It had been fun. ... but this line was never going to compete with the 'Swiss' line.
My initial selection of the incompatible pair of sweetcorn was quite blind, based on very little information. Perhaps a different pair would have produced a more useful line.
Tim DH
If you've read this far, you will have gathered that in England we have very limited access to the Maize Gene Pool. Reading on this forum I have got interested in the idea that it might be possible to grow maize from a direct sowing. (It's something I've long suspected, since the Fodder Maize occasionally grown round here must be direct sown.) A number of people seem to have used the wide genetic diversity of Painted Mountain as a starting point for projects, so I set my heart on trying some.
I did find a UK supplier of PM. ... two websites offer it, but since they both offer exactly the same range of seeds, at the same price, with identical pictures/descriptions, I guess they are just different fronts for the same company. I ordered some seed and was deeply disappointed by what I received. The 100 seed count for the PM was 17grams! It was the sort of stuff which normally gets put in our chicken feed bin.
I decided to try ordering PM from anyone/anywhere. Some suppliers say on their websites that they don't ship internationally. Some of the rest don't reply to emails. Some do reply, ... negatively! I eventually succeeded in placing an order with Baker Creek. Tho' their website does say that they are not responsible if the shipment gets confiscated or destroyed! It also says that they don't ship to the EU. We are currently in a curious transition period regarding which EU rules apply and which don't. So it was a matter of paying up and waiting. (I also put in an order with an EU based supplier.)
The Baker Creek order arrived today. Perhaps it arrived courtesy of 'Santa's Sleigh' (the volume of other small parcels in transit at this time of year) making checking everything difficult. Perhaps it was fully checked against who knows which set of rules, and passed. Either way it got through.
The 100 weight of the Baker Creek seed is 29grams. That's 70% better than the English sample! Incidentally in the process of counting out, I got 91 seeds from the first packet, which declares it contains a min of 50 seeds.
To say I'm happy is putting it mildly
Happy Christmas! Roll on 2022!!
Happy Days! Maize planting started today!
My experience of pot started maize suggests that burying the seedlings really deep when planting out is the best insurance against wind rock/lodging. I end up with the soil surface of the pot about 4" below the soil surface of the bed, often completely burying the first leaf in the process. It's a laborious job, which is why I'm interested in trialling direct sown maize.
Of course, Painted Mountain may be inherently more wind resistant than my Swiss maize. So a first experiment is to see how it performs over different planting depths. I'll be scoring it for emergence and standing.
I spent ages trying to work out how to consistently plant the seed to a given, but variable, depth. My best guess solution is using long nosed pliers! The tape on them is to mark different depths. I'm trying 3", 4", 5" and 6". Planting through ground cover fabric.
Tim DH
Very interesting project. I'm afraid I can't add much of value as where I live in the US most any corn can be direct planted and grows very well. Just what to wish you good luck and keep us informed of how it goes.
Thanks for the encouragement Reed.
I did a second planting today... Again at 3", 4", 5" & 6". Its the next piece of the ground cover along from the first batch. Before I started I checked on the slug population under the cover. It wasn't a large number. The soil temp at 6" is about 10oC. .... I wish I'd checked it a fortnight ago.
Non of the first batch are showing. I have no idea whether the seed is sitting tight, or if its rotted, or if its been eaten. If the second batch shows up, I'll at least know that the first batch has failed and I can re-sow.
I'll try a third batch, into fresh ground, in about a fortnight.
Tim DH
A really interesting project and inspiring to boot.
I'm hoping to start a maize mix next season (I'm in Australia so late November where I live). My main interest is polenta. We don't have great access to corn varieties here being mostly either hybrid sweet corn or animal fodder that is grown but I have managed to put together a mix I'm happy to start with. Since I don't have very many seeds of each of the varieties I'll be starting them in trays and putting up an electric rodent fence one planted out (the cats work hard but they can only eat so many mice!) I'm hoping to harvest enough corn to be able to direct sow from then on.
I'll be selecting reds, oranges and yellows, perhaps allowing a small number of white but definitely no blues or purples. The thought of grey polenta puts me right off!
Not posted on here for a while!
Working with (completely new to me) Painted Mountain
This year I'm just testing direct sowing: Spacing, Depth and Planting/Harvest Dates
The trial bed is 12 rows(30cm apart) of five holes (30cm apart)
The right hand four rows were sown on April 11th
Left to Right 1st row 6" deep, 2nd row 5" deep, 3rd row 4" deep 4th row 3" deep
Emergence L to R 0, 0, 3, 2.
The central four rows were sown on April 27th
Left to Right 1st row 6" deep, 2nd row 5" deep, 3rd row 4" deep 4th row 3" deep
Emergence L to R 1, 4, 3, 2.
The left hand four rows were sown on May 11th
Right to Left 1st row 6" deep, 2nd row 5" deep, 3rd row 4" deep 4th row 3" deep
Emergence R to L 1, 2, 4, 1.
SO:
Aggregating the results by date gives:
April 11th 25% Emergence
April 27th 50%
May 11th 40%
Aggregating the results by planting depth gives:
6" 10% Emergence
5" 30%
4" 50%
3" 25%
Plenty of data there to guide a proper planting next year.
Tim DH
First two cobs from direct sown Painted Mountain. ... So it is possible in the UK.
The cobs are from plants sown on April 11th . Last frost date for us is around April 25th, and these weren't up by then, so I could go a bit earlier.
The seed size looks respectable, once they are properly dried down I'll weigh a 100 seed count.
Tim DH
Time to start evaluating the Painted Mountain experiment.
Pictured below:
Best 4 cobs from April 11th planting (on right) Total weight 323g
Best 4 cobs from April 27th planting (on left) Total weight 325g
Separated by a couple of exceptional Swiss cobs (over 400g each!)
(I've had trouble drying down the cobs from the May 11th planting.)
SO I think I'm settling on sowing a full bed next year, around mid April at 4.5" depth. I'll sow at slightly higher density to counter the predicted germination failure at that date/depth. (Hopefully the selection pressure will result in better germination at that date/depth in subsequent years!)
The 100 seed weight of my Painted Mountain is 35g. So a shade over double what the UK supplier was 'prepared' to sell to me!
Ive just finished selecting my yellow flour maize line for this year. Pic of the twelve chosen cobs below. The 100 seed weight for the selected cobs is 44g. I've decided to offer this line on Ebay. I thought it needed a name before it entered the public domain so I've called it Yorkshire Grit. I'm not aware of anything like it (Northern adapted flour maize) being available in the UK. But since, historically, its not a thing, I do wonder how many people might be looking for it!
Neat! That looks like a lovely selection
My direct sown maize is looking good.
There is a fair amount of variation in stem colour and silk colour, but the tassels are the most diverse. I particularly like this red and lemon one.
Tim DH
The direct sown maize is in. Attached photo of the twelve selected cobs for seed and also a photo of most of the other cobs.
Once I've got it stripped and sorted it'll be interesting to see how the grams/metre rate compares with my 'traditional' grain (wheat & oats) and the pot started maize (Yorkshire Grit)
So I've got the direct sown maize sorted and dried. Not counting the fraction of thin grains which got fed to the chickens and not counting the grains which got nicked by a rodent during the drying process (Grrr) It cropped 513g/m. This is comparable to a good Wheat or Rye yield. Its my first year growing this maize in a standard bed. I don't think I've got the spacing quite right yet, so I may manage to push up the yield next year.
The 100 seed weight is about 39g, which is significantly better than last years little trial (35g)
Following discussions with the wife, next year I'll start selecting against Blue grains. Its a shame because Blue grains look so nice on the cobs, but they aren't welcome in the kitchen.
I've made the selection for next years 'Yorkshire Grit' seed. Here are the twelve mother cobs.
This maize had a good year, cropping at 740g/m.
I offered seed on Ebay last year. I wasn't sure how it would do because growing flour maize for kitchen use is not a thing in the UK. It shifted twelve units, so that achieved something in terms of propagating the idea. ... Ideas are a bit like seeds! I wonder how many of those twelve ideas will get past germination and actually establish.
I thought there are potential nutritional advantages in blue, black, purple corn types?
Hi Michele,
I think you are right. If you google Morado Maize or Purple Maize you'll find lots of references. However, having tried to get people to eat/accept Blue Maize, I think that is a step too far here! Just getting folk to eat/accept white/yellow maize (which isn't Sweetcorn) is hard enough.
My interest in promoting Maize is to provide a bit of variety in the starch component of a meal. My wife objects to potatoes on more than three consecutive nights! (Also there is often a 'Potato Gap' in late spring to be filled.) After a bit of experimentation, Nixtamalised Yellow Maize is acceptable. Actually better than that, it is requested! (Another acceptable alternative is Rye served like Brown Rice.)
As you'll see from further back in this thread, I am starting to experiment with red/brown maize, but getting that into our diet is I think dependant on the prior acceptance of yellow/white maize.
Tim DH
Quote from: Tim DH on 2023-12-06, 04:14:06 AMHi Michele,
I think you are right. If you google Morado Maize or Purple Maize you'll find lots of references. However, having tried to get people to eat/accept Blue Maize, I think that is a step too far here! Just getting folk to eat/accept white/yellow maize (which isn't Sweetcorn) is hard enough.
My interest in promoting Maize is to provide a bit of variety in the starch component of a meal. My wife objects to potatoes on more than three consecutive nights! (Also there is often a 'Potato Gap' in late spring to be filled.) After a bit of experimentation, Nixtamalised Yellow Maize is acceptable. Actually better than that, it is requested! (Another acceptable alternative is Rye served like Brown Rice.)
As you'll see from further back in this thread, I am starting to experiment with red/brown maize, but getting that into our diet is I think dependant on the prior acceptance of yellow/white maize.
Tim DH
Reminds me of what happened in some parts of Ireland during the early days of the Potato Famine. Some people did try and send supplies, but they sent yellow cornmeal instead of flour or potatoes (since that it what they had at the time,) and many Irish rejected it saying they would "rather starve than eat brimstone colored cornbread".
I have also heard tell that one of the reasons Gaspe bay flint became so popular in Canada was that its color was the closest to wheat of the corns around, which made settlers more conformable.
Just got the direct sown maize in. 20 seeds/m, through groundcover, at a depth of 4 ½". A bit later than I'd like but not disastrous.
I've given some thought to last year's poor emergence. I think planting the seed with long nosed pliers can result in a depression, or even tube, in the soil. A great place for molluscs to shelter, and then the new shoot has to get up past them! So this year I sieved some super fine, super dry soil. I drizzled this into each planting place after the seed had gone in.
This year I've planted seed from the last three harvests AND the last of the original seed. I'm thinking that maybe I'll save seed from the best 15 cobs in future and plant from the previous four years every time. That would give a notional 'mother' pool of 60 plants.
Tim DH
Interesting project. If you are looking to deep plant the Hopi Blue is the one to include - even if you backcross and select against blue at a later point. It has the long coleoptile trait and was traditionally sown at up to 12 inches of so deep.Though you would want to test what ever you seed you could obtain as it is probably no longer selected by its growers for that trait. I planted 4 varieties and they mostly 90% ish at 4-6 inches. But the seed was fresh and I think that also makes a difference. That was Glass Gem, Painted Mountain, Hopi blue flour and a Shane's Parrot Proof another flour. I'm working on a low input rain only flour and flint lines. If you are looking to separate out flint genetics you can add sugar to a water and mix until you get enough separation (heavier flint types will sink/lighter flour will float) - and you can use that over successive generations to push your lines in the direction you want. Hope that helps.
Hi Steve,
Thanks for the info. I have tried Hopi Blue, but I could only get it to maturity in a greenhouse. (Under those conditions the pollen goes mouldy on the leaves!) I did cross it with a Northern adapted sweetcorn, but even then I don't think it would have survived direct sowing.
The floating technique for selecting against flint is something I hadn't thought of. Nice idea.
Shane's Parrot Proof is new to me. I'm curious, what feature makes it parrot proof? Not that its much of a problem for us in Yorkshire!
Tim DH
Shane is a plant breeder up north of Australia. His line is a dent with very tight husks that make it hard but not impossible for the parrots to get at it. Much better than Hopi Blue in that regard. Working that trait into all my lines as we have more parrots than you can poke a stick at.
Very cool project!
Quote from: Tim DH on 2025-05-01, 03:15:59 AMShane's Parrot Proof is new to me. I'm curious, what feature makes it parrot proof? Not that its much of a problem for us in Yorkshire!
Parrot proofing might be a useful characteristic to have sooner or later. Budgies (Budgerigar) are a type of parrot and are notorious for eating seeds. There are reputedly 10's of thousands wild in London and they are moving further north every year
The Direct Sown maize did well this year. Plenty of cobs to choose from.
I'm continuing to select FOR
Tolerance to deep sowing.
Early maturity
and AGAINST
Tall plants
Blue seeds
I'll take enough "not blue" seeds off these cobs to provide a quarter of my requirements for each of the next four years.
Tim DH
Yorkshire Grit
Has done well this year. Negligible aphid activity in the ears, a little (presumed) rat damage to cob tips. The middle of the bed got HIT by a punch of wind mid season, sending plants sprawling in all directions, but none of the stems were snapped.
I'm going to start selecting against mega cobs like this one. They can be beautiful, but they are a nuisance to dry down, I think because of the big core. This one is eighteen rows.
IMG_20251004_140944_HDR_edited.jpg
Amazing maize for Yorkshire, especially if it's floury. I lost track of its convoluted origin.
Hi Grano,
The origin of 'Yorkshire Grit' is quite simple. ... Its a Swiss Ribelmais, crossed with a northern adapted Sweetcorn. After that came a decade or two of selection. I guess it periodically gets 'contaminated' by pollen from the sweetcorn which my allotment neighbours grow, but I don't think that is a bad thing, for me at least!
Does anyone have any opinions on internally cracked maize seeds? It must say something about the starch content? I'm guessing its not good for planting? I've always, instinctively, selected against it, but not for any definite reason, other than that I'm suspicious of it!
Just finished stripping the direct sown coloured maize. Yield about 845g/m, which compares very favourably to traditional grain. (My dwarf rye did about 500g/m this year.) The 100 seed count is 35g
Hello Tim,
Your flour corn breeding programme looks brilliant! I've been thinking about doing something similar. Would it be possible to buy some of your seed please?
Best wishes,
Diana
Tim,
I'd like to see a cross-section of one of your yellow kernels.
Hi Grano,
Not easy to cut these kernels now they are dry! Hopefully this selection will show you what you want to see.
IMG_20251104_141328_HDR_edited.jpg
Hi Diana,
Which line are you interested in? The yellow one,'Yorkshire Grit' is pot sown and transplanted, which is quite a lot of work. If you live further South, then you might get away with direct sowing it. The multicoloured line, a selection of 'Painted Mountain', is direct sown, but if you are much further North you might have to pot sow it. (You can't really grow more than one line in the same space.)
Yorkshire Grit is stable/completed as a project. For the last couple of years I have been offering seed of it on EBay. However I took down the page over the Summer, as we took the roof off the house and whilst that job was on, I didn't want to be bothered by going to the Post Office! I should get the page back up in the next fortnight.
Tim DH
When I want to split a kernel, I use a small pair of wire-cutters, trying not to cut myself.
To my un-trained eye, the kernels look like a flint corn with a dose of flour corn. No surprise.
Somewhere I read that sweet corn is a mutation of flint.
Hello Tim,
Thanks so much for your reply. I grow at a Farm near Winford, North Somerset and ideally I want to breed an outdoor sown blue flour corn. So I'm guessing your multicoloured line would be perfect for that? I thought maybe I would mix in some new genetics as well. Although I need to do some homework as I'm not fully up to speed on understanding how to work with flint, flour & Sweetcorn genetics. Maybe add Glass Gem Popcorn? or Double red sweetcorn for colour? I have a bit of Astronomy Domain Sweetcorn which has incredible vigour and did well direct sown a couple of years ago. But that seed is quite old now as last two seasons I didn't get a crop (badger or deer ate it. Fencing will happen before planting in 2026...) Although perhaps adding sweetcorn is a mad idea... I'll go and do some homework now. Where would you go with it next if Blue flour corn, for tortillas was your aim?
Hi Diana,
I messed around with Blue maize, sometime last Millennium. In the end I just ditched it. On cooking, the Blue ends up with a cold grey food on your plate. It's hard enough getting friends/family to accept maize as a human food stuff.
Working with Sweetcorn is no problem. The various 'Sweet' genes are all recessive, and since the 'sweet' kernels shrivel on the cob, selecting against them is dead easy. If you dry mill your maize, then 'sweet' kernels need to be removed because they have a tendency to gum up the mill!
Tim DH
Tim,
Re: cracked kernels.
They are usually attributed to rapid or high heat drying. Rapid cooling can also cause cracks. How do you dry your maize?
Hi Grano,
That's interesting. Our initial drying is in the field. We follow that up with windowsill drying, before stripping off the kernels.
This year, for the first time ever, I got what might have been sun scald on a few of my tomatoes. So maybe some of the maize cobs got toasted too. ....
Tim,
What time of year does your maize produce silk, and what is the weather like then?
There is a fairly impressive weather station on our allotment which tracks fifteen variables! ...
https://www.caagawx.org/index.html
Sadly, I didn't record the date on which the silks appear.
Tim DH
Hi Tim,
Thanks for your reply about my hope of starting a UK blue flour corn breeding programme. I'm not worried about the colour. There is a company in Bristol that makes blue flour tortillas and they are very popular! We eat them quite regularly. Corn is such a great staple crop. Would you be willing to sell me some seed of your multicoloured corn experiment? Maybe 250 - 300 seeds? or whatever you can spare?
Best wishes,
Diana
Hi Diana,
You're right about maize being a great staple crop. ... So sparing seed isn't a problem!
Coloured Maize.jpg
PM me an address and I'll mail you some. What's more I can select blue seeds for you!
Tim DH
Tomorrow, hopefully, is direct sowing day for maize. Seed saved from the best dozen cobs from each of the last four years. So that is a notional 48 mother plants. Sowing depth 4.5", controlled by the pliers.
Why so deep?
Edit: oh for lodging. Is your stand particularly thin because corn doesn't have that problem here and we have 40mph wind off the plains.
Hi Martin,
I don't think its just wind speed with us. I live in a built up area which I guess increases the turbulence. Last year, one of my maize patches looked like someone had set off a bomb in the middle of it. Stalks pushed in all directions from a central spot. That was exceptional.
The usual problem is the constantly changing direction of the wind, which can worry a hole round the plants. Of course its difficult to scientifically measure/prove, but I reckon deeper planting helps reduce wind rock.
It is also possible that I get slightly less slug damage on the emerging seedlings with deeper planting.