Rural Heritage April/May 2026

removal may sometimes actually decrease the yield of both grain and stover. The leaves are the part of the plant in which the raw material taken in by the roots and the leaves themselves is converted into food and plant tissue. The number of leaves varies with the number of nodes. Heavily leaved varieties are preferred for silage. In times of drought, the leaves roll inward reducing the area exposed to the sun and wind and the amount of moisture lost from them. The flowers. The male and female reproductive organs (flowers) are separate in the corn plant. The tassel bears the male (staminate) flowers in which the pollen is produced. The female (pistillate)

nodes varies in different varieties or types but seems to be about the same in all members of a variety or strain. Small northern varieties have 10 to 12 nodes while the large, rank-growing sorts of the South have Showing the steps in the development of the corn ear. The tassel (a) has on each branch (b) many staminate or male flowers (c). Each stamen (d) contains pollengrains (e) some of which when discharged light on the tip of a silk (f) which contains a tube leading to the ovary (g) which, when fertilized, becomes a kernel (h) on the ear (i).

from 18 to 20. The height of the stem varies from 18 to 20 inches in some of the dwarf forms, to 18 to 20 feet in some of the large southern varieties. Unlike that of most grasses, the stem is not hollow but filled with a soft pith. Usually, a plant has but one culm or stem, but occasionally one or more tillers or suckers will develop from buds at nodes near the soil surface. If the stand is crowded, the soil thin or the moisture supply deficient, these buds never grow, or the tillers drop off before they have made much growth. If conditions are more favorable, the tillers may reach full height and produce more or less grain. Sweet, pop, and pod corn tiller more than the dent types, and some varieties tiller more freely than others. It does not pay to remove tillers, in fact, their

April/May 2026

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