Our sweet corn produced really well this year. We had 16 rows at 150' each. With 6" plant spacing, that equals about 5500 stalks. Each stalk typically yields one ear. Not bad, giving away 5500 ears of corn!
I did not realize that. We planted corn on our farm once. I was in HS and don't recall. I remember my uncle telling me that corn had high nitrogen requirements and water, when needed, was critical. We used a roll-out type of irrigation that we made a hole in for each row. The hole could be plugged with a cap as needed. I will try to find a picture.
My garden sucks this year. Planted late. Making pretty many tomatoes but few peppers. Cucumbers fell victim to cut worms. Just planted some for the fall. Also just planted my okra 7 days ago. No biggie with the okra, really. Will have some later than usual but it'll still make.
@lsutiga Okra is pretty easy. We plant it all through the summer as space becomes available. It loves the heat. For irrigation, we have sprinklers on 10' poles that are supplied by a 2" main line, that go down to 3/4". We have it set on a timer, but for the most part start them manually when needed and just set them to cut off after a certain period. For our tomatoes and peppers, we have a 500 gal cistern that gets filled by the runoff from a roof. It's cool because this water isn't treated. it works great for irrigating a couple of our long rows. That pipe in the pic is cool. I guess we would need to put a slope on the rows to get it to flow down. Might look into that.
Doesn't need a slope, as the ditch fills the row wicks it up. I don't know if it would be practical for your operation though. I've only used it with 12 inch pipe. It hooks up to a riser in a field. They may make smaller diameter ones for hoses, not sure.
Damn. 12" is serious water! We were happy as heck when we got the 2" line. We have 2" risers coming off of the 2" pipe that we then hook the 3/4" hoses too. Our 10' sprinklers work pretty well, but I hate getting the water on the leaves. From the ground up is way better. Yeah, corn is technically a grass. We side dress w/ Nitrogen about a third of the way through. Shit takes off then!
I talked to my preacher about this - he is our resident farmer - he has done this. The problem for us is that our garden is not graded super well and would have lots of places w/ standing water and other spots the water probably wouldn't get to. Maybe I can get one of those guys laser guided guys to come do some grading for me! I love the idea. Brilliant in it's simplicity.
I wouldn't worry about that. When it needs water, it's dry. Also, the ditches between the rows will eventually fill up enough to run. Our fields back then didn't have any extra leveling efforts. We used to have one of those buckets they use with laser-leveling. My neighbor is a farmer and does that on the side. There was a program that you could get laser-leveling done on the government's dime. Saves erosion. Check with you local ASCS office. Agricultural Stabilization and Conservation Service
