http:\/\/ohioline.osu.edu\/agf-fact\/0128.html<\/p>\n
Being a city boy, I kind of had the right idea, but couldn’t figure out one detail. The tassel of the corn plant spews out the pollen, but in order for the kernels to form, they have to be pollinated – but the kernels are deep inside the husk. How does the male pollen get to the females to create little baby corns?<\/p>\n
The answer is pretty amazing – the silk are hollow tubes, each one connected to one future kernel. When the pollen lands on the silk, it immediately starts growing – moving through the silk until it reaches the female flower and makes it pregnant \ud83d\ude09<\/p>\n
Once fertilized, that silk turns brown and detaches its job is done. So uniform brown silk is a sign of a fully pollinated ear of corn inside.<\/p>\n
But these days, with hybrid corn, irrgation and pesticides, I don’t remember getting bad ears of corn, but I do remember it as a child in the 1960s<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
http:\/\/ohioline.osu.edu\/agf-fact\/0128.html Being a city boy, I kind of had the right idea, but couldn’t figure out one detail. The tassel of the corn plant spews out the pollen, but in order for the kernels to form, they have to be … Continue reading