weird corn! has any one seen this?

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As my wife and I were walking down our gravel road the other evening,we glanced over into a corn field(field corn, not sweet corn) and noticed several plants with ears growing out of the top, not covered by husks .The plants were bowed over from the weight of the misplaced ear. Has anyone seen this?...any explanations, reasons?

-- Eric Davis (errikd@hotmail.com), August 06, 2000

Answers

I believe that it is caused by some sort of stress on the plant. It could be caused by drought or by damage to the roots of the plant during cultivation or by the use of too much fertilizer or the county using herbicides, etc.

-- Green (ratdogs10@yahoo.com), August 06, 2000.

This could be a "throwback". I have read somewhere that the forerunners of modern corn, a maize raised by Aztecs (or was it Incas?) was indeed as you describe, ie. the "ear" was where we would expect to find the tassel. Wish I could be more specific, but your description does ring a bell. GL!

-- Brad (Homefixer@SacoRiver.net), August 12, 2000.

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