In 1996, when the raised beds had first been built, Steve and I talked about what vegetables to grow. Tomatoes topped my list, corn was Steve's first choice. A little patch of corn filled one bed, four 'Early Girl' tomato seedlings from the nursery went in the middle bed, then we waited to see what would happen.

The Tomatoes ~ The tomatoes took over everything within a ten foot radius of the bed, many fruits going to waste by rotting on the ground undiscovered; it was impossible to get to the middle of the plants. So last year we grew them in 6' tall, 18" wide cages made from concrete reinforcing wire. We bought a roll of this at a local home improvement center for I believe about $20. The wire itself is 6' wide, so you only need to cut lengths of it and roll them up to create the cages.

Making them took Steve an hour wielding a wire cutter and the application of some heavy tie-wraps, his universal solution for joining things. Each cage was secured to the ground with two 8' plastic-coated metal poles, each pole embedded 2' deep. We bought the poles in the garden section of a local department store. The openings in the wire as manufactured are 4" square which makes it easy to reach in and harvest, though a few Brandywine tomatoes were too big and had to be maneuvered out the top. We were able to grow eight plants this way, though space in our garden is very tight.

I'd like to say the tomatoes were no trouble at all, but in peak season you have to walk by and spend a minute or two poking the tomato vines back into the cage every day - they grow that fast. About the middle of summer, we pruned any diseased leaves or non-fruiting vines, making sure to throw away the clippings. Since I prefer a plant that takes no maintenance, I rate this fifteen minutes of work as "burdensome" but well worth it at harvest time. There were plenty for the neighbors and unlike zucchini, no one ever asks you to stop bringing tomatoes by in the summer.

The Corn ~ The corn did not fare so well the first year. The blackbirds ate all but half a dozen seeds. I couldn't help but admire their precision in drilling holes exactly where the kernels had been seeded. They even had the spacing down pat. It was almost as though they'd seen a corn patch before.

The few plants the blackbirds left us matured but because corn is a grass and wind pollinated, the silks didn't catch enough pollen from each other and the ears didn't fill out very well. We picked just enough corn to let us know it was worthwhile as a backyard crop. Since it should be grown in a patch of no less than four rows, corn takes some room but the common wisdom is true - if you start the water boiling, then pick the corn, shuck it and throw it in the pot, in about three minutes you will have a feast fit for kings, and perhaps a bit too good for some of those.

The corn patch in '97 did much better. We cut the blackbirds off at the pass and covered the seeds right after planting with a row cover, so they couldn't be disturbed. Once the 'Breeder's Bi-Color' corn plants were about 3" high and showing their true leaves, we removed the cover and everything was nearly perfect after that. Except for the moths.

Because our yard had been lawn for many years, the predators that prefer vegetables were nowhere to be seen the first year. The second year we grew corn, in the last few weeks of the season, the corn ear worms found the crop. The first batch was almost undamaged but the second that was growing along six weeks behind it had a caterpillar in almost every ear. I suspect that this year, we will have to deal with them from the beginning. They've found us now.

Though it's quite a surprise to be shucking an ear of corn over the compost pile and find something fat and wriggly in it, really the ears are only ruined for serving as corn-on-the-cob. The caterpillar works its way down in a narrow track, leaving most of the ear undamaged. Stomp the caterpillar and cut off the unmunched corn on the other side of the cob, or break off the top and use the pristine bottom half of the ear.* Then it's corn bread, creamed corn or just plain steamed, cut corn for dinner. Yum.

Text and images Copyright 1998 Cyndi Kirkpatrick. All rights reserved