Mama Corn: The stalk brought you.
I admit that the title of this post is a bit of a tease. There are not pictures of strippers to follow, only corn tassels and corn silk. It has been two weeks since I last posted pictures of the corn and it has changed significantly. It is now between seven and nine feet tall, the outer rows shorter and the inner rows taller.
The corn is as high as an elephant's eye,
An' it looks like it's climbin' clear up to the sky
That is a pretty accurate lyric since the average elephant is between nine and thirteen feet tall (thank you Google).
In the picture below you can see how tall the corn is in relation to the circle irrigation equipment. I really really wanted to use an elephant for comparison but I just wasn't able to swing it.
Going into the field now is a bit like going into a jungle
The corn has tasseled now so it won't get any taller. The tassel is the male flower. The pollen falls from the tassel down the stalk and pollinates the silk, which is the female flower, on the newly forming ears. If everything goes according to plan, the ear is fertilized and it develops into yummy corn on the cob.
TASSELS
SILK
One last interesting fact. Each stalk of corn usually produces one or two good ears of corn. If you look closely there are three immature ears on this stalk. The plant only needs one good ear to survive and produce seeds but it's just making sure by sending up two or three immature ears. At most, two will actually develop.
Too much biology?
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