Dl6—Lancaster Farming, Saturday, November 3,1984
NEWARK, Del. Sweet corn is
an important Delmarva vegetable
crop. Delaware growers produce
between 4,000 and 4,500 acres each
year. Over half is yellow sweet
corn for .processing. The rest is
grown for fresh market use. Most
of this is white sweet corn for sale
through local roadside markets,
though a good bit of both is shipped
to destinations throughout the
Northeast.
According to University of
Delaware estension vegetable
specialist Ed Kee, most fresh
market customers prefer Silver
Queen, a white kerneled variety
with excellent flavor, keeping
quality and appearance. Un
fortunately for growers, however,
production of this variety can be
erratic and it matures late, usually
taking over 90 days to reach
harvest.
During the last 10 years several
seed companies have begun
breeding programs aimed at
developing good looking, high
quality, early maturing white
sweet com varieties to fill the gap
before Silver Queen comes on. As a
result, several promising new
hybrids are now available com
mercially.
Last summer Kee evaluated 27
of these new hybrids under local
growing conditions at the
Kee evaluates new
sweet corn varieties
University of Delaware
Georgetown substation. All were
planted on May 23. Each variety
was subjected to three different
herbicide treatments to test for
adverse reactions. In addition, 100
seeds of each variety were sub
jected to a stress test at 50 degrees
F in a germination chamber of the
Delaware State Department of
Agriculture.
Here are Kee’s comments on
several of the most promisinmg
entries.
White Satin (63 days, Agway)
and Pearl White (65 days, Agway)
looked good with ears 7 1/2-inches
long and excellent tip fill. Pearl
White’s ear set up higher on the
stalk than White Satin’s ear.
Chalice (67 days, Rogers) had
excellent eating quality with an
ear that measured 8 1/2-inches
long. Summer Sweet (73 days,
Abbott and Cobb) had an at
tractive 8-inch ear set fairly high
on the stalk.
Another attractive variety that
will fill the harvest gap before
Silver Queen comes along was
Silver Sensation (73 days, Southern
States). Silver Treat (73 days,
Agway) produced a 9-inch ear
which was similar to that of Silver
Queen, and had excellent tip fill. It
also set up high on the stalk. Silver
Prince (90 days, Harris) had a
long, attractive ear with excellent
quality that matured a few days
before Silver Queen.
One experimental number stood
out over other numbered lines.
Asgrow’s XPH 2554 W was ready to
harvest at 73 days and had a 9-mch
ear with excellent tip fill.
Kee advises growers who are
interested in trying any of these
new varieties to do so on a small
scale the first year. Growing
conditions especially heat during
tasseling and silking vary from
year to year on Delmarva and
could influence yield and quality.
Regarding the herbicides
screened in the trial, Kee says it
would be premature to draw any
firm conclusions from only one
year’s data. However, he was
reassured to see that the standard
labeled treatments were safe
across all varieties. Shorter season
hybrids did seem to be adversely
affected by certain materials
which are not currently labeled.
Kee plans to continue this work
next summer. He will report on the
results of the sweet corn variety
trial December 6 at the Peninsula
Horticultural Society’s vegetable
meeting at the Wicomico Youth
and Civic Center in Salisbury, Md.
Watch local papers for details on
that event.
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