Mirai Corn

Anybody else growing this? I'm trying it this year, and it's almost ready. I was just wondering if it's all it's hyped up to be?

Dunno.. But I've been trying to find out about it. So, when you try it, please post your thoughts on it..

Finally, my Mirai corn is ready to start harvesting. First, let me say that I am only just beginning to get the first ears of corn from this harvest, but here are my first impressions: It's tender..........very, very tender in fact. The kernels burst with the slightest amount of pressure. Now, I understand why Park's Seeds states that this corn can't be harvested with a machine. The ears are filled all the way to the tip, and the corn does seem to be extra sweet. The corn itself is gorgeous.........I'm attaching a few pics so you can see for yourself.

For a negative, personally I find Mirai to be somewhat lacking in "corn taste". By that I mean I just don't get that rich corn flavor from Mirai. Other people that I've had try it don't seem to mind, but I wish it had a little more old fashioned corn flavor.

Here's another shot:

And a close-up:

Razorback, thanks for posting. That's interesting. I've read that the taste is suppose to up there too. Hum... That's good to know cuz I like that corny taste too...

This year I planted and grew 2 separate crops of corn. We had an unusually warm March, so I decided to gamble and put out an early planting of corn. For this, I hurried down to our local seed store and selected "Incredible". Mainly, because I hadn't tried it before and I figured it had to be better than the rest of their limited selection. The weather turned much colder not long after I planted the "Incredible", (it actually got down to 17 degrees while the corn was still in the ground) and predictably, the resultant stand of corn was fairly sparse. I toyed with the idea of plowing it up and starting over, but decided to just leave it in hopes that it would produce at least some corn before the Mirai got ready. Well not only did it produce, but it was delicious to boot. It wasn't nearly as tender as the Mirai, but it did have a stronger "corn" flavor. That may just be a SE vs a Supersweet thing, or it may just be my imagination.

lolll.. Thank you my resident corn expert. :)

Can't say that I've planted any yet since I've just moved and starting the landscaping now.. But thank you for the info. I intent to grow corn in the veggie bed...

It looks wonderful!!! I'm trying corn again. Tried it last year with dismal results. This year I made 7 4'x4' raised beds and gave them 2 of their own. (Well, almost!) I have Honey'n'Cream, Sugar Dots, and Trinity out there. A couple are just starting to silk. I can hardly wait to see what develops!

Sequee, nice.. let me know what's your favorite.. I want to do corn too.

Corn sometimes has a difficult time pollinating itself, especially if you're only planting a small number of plants. To help it out, you might try to shake the pollen from the tassels down onto the silks. Just bend the top until it's directly above the silk and then give it a good shake. You have to time this right, and be sure and try it on a day that's not very windy.

Of course, It's best to just plant a whole bunch of rows next to each other and then let nature take it's course.

Razor, ooo... thank you for that info.. I was only gonna do like 4 or 6 plants.. You think I'd have to hand pollinate like that still.. Like how many is not considered a small number of plants???

Yes, I'd say that's definitely a small number of plants, and that you'll need to give them all the help you can when it comes to pollination. If you plant as many as 50 plants, but you put them all in a single row, they're likely to have pollination problems. Most folks recommend that you plant corn in sections that are at least 3 rows wide. (mine was actually 6 rows wide) I've never tried to plant that small of a number of plants, so I'm a little curious as to how you do.

Space was not a problem for me since I was planting in a large field. I actually planted 1000 seeds of Mirai and probably got 800 of that to come up. Another couple of hundred either died prematurely or got thinned out, so I probably ended up with somewhere around 500-600 stalks of corn. From that, I've harvested around 200 ears already. Yes, I know.......that's a lot of corn, but I really, really like my corn and we freeze what we don't eat straight from the garden.

Read these helpful items from Ohio State University and Mississippi State University. I thought the last 2 items from OSU were particularly interesting.

* Pollen shed usually begins two to three days prior to silk emergence and continues for five to eight days with peak shed on the third day. On a typical midsummer day, the shedding of pollen is in the morning between 9:00 and 11:00 a.m.

* The tassel is usually fully emerged and stretched out before any pollen is shed. Pollen shed begins at the middle of the central spike of the tassel and spreads out later over the whole tassel with the lower branches last to shed pollen.

* Pollen grains are borne in anthers, each of which contains a large number of pollen grains. The anthers open and the pollen grains pour out in early to mid morning after dew has dried off the tassels. Pollen is light and is often carried considerable distances by the wind. However, most of it settles within 20 to 50 feet.

* Pollen shed is not a continuous process. It stops when the tassel is too wet or too dry and begins again when temperature conditions are favorable. Pollen stands little chance of being washed off the silks during a rain storm as little to none is shed when the tassel is wet. Also, silks are covered with fine, sticky hairs which serve to catch and anchor pollen grains.

* Under favorable conditions, pollen grain remains viable for only 18 to 24 hours. However, the pollen grain starts growth of the pollen tube down the silk channel within minutes of coming in contact with a silk and the pollen tube grows the length of the silk and enters the female flower (ovule) in 12 to 28 hours.

* A well developed ear shoot should have 750 to 1,000 ovules (potential kernels) each producing a silk. The silks from near the base of the ear emerge first and those from the tip appear last. Under good conditions, all silks will emerge and be ready for pollination within 3 to 5 days and this usually provides adequate time for all silks to be pollinated before pollen shed ceases.

* Pollen of a given plant rarely fertilizes the silks of the same plant. Under field conditions 97% or more of the kernels produced by each plant are pollinated by other plants in the field.

* The amount of pollen is rarely a cause of poor kernel set. Each tassel contains from 2 to 5 million pollen grains which translates to 2,000 to 5,000 pollen grains produced for each silk of the ear shoot. Shortages of pollen are usually only a problem under conditions of extreme heat and drought. Poor seed set is more often associated with poor timing of pollen shed with silk emergence (silks emerging after pollen shed).

And from MSU:

Corn pollen is carried by the wind as it falls from the tassel to the silks of the ears. If anything prevents this wind transfer of pollen, the result is ears with empty rows and missing kernels. Corn planted in a single row loses most of its pollen. This is why corn should be planted in a block of adjacent rows rather than one or two very long rows.

This message was edited Jul 19, 2007 12:51 PM

Razor, after reading your posting, I thin I'll do 2 rows of three. Hopefully that will help with the pollenation...

I'm trying Mirai Corn this year. I had bought the seed last year and the germination was pretty good. I have 6-7 rows of about 10 plants ea.. They are starting to show silk. Waiting to see how they taste. Waiting!

I have about a 15x15 foot plot for corn. (But this year I had to squeeze some potatoes in it.) I also planted another kind of corn. Found the packet! It is Kandy King which I am also trying. The store didn't have anything else left. The y were planted the same only later. No tassles or silk yet.

Let me know how y'all fair. (Yes, I speak southern)

Also, let me know what you think of the taste. As I've stated earlier, I find it really sweet but somewhat lacking in traditional corn flavor. My wife totally loves it and has already informed me that we _will_ be planting more next year!

I love the southern!!! LOL we sound so dull up here!

Will let you know!

The Mirai is coming in and I'm pleased with the taste and texture. Not getting many ears though. I would say about half the plants. I would try it again to see if I get better results since the seed was a year old. I like the really sweet corn so don't know if I'm the best judge for you guys. Big sweet tooth here.

I grew Mirai this year, and IMO it's everything it's cracked up to be. It definitely is sweet, and I like the texture. I will be growing this one next year. :=)

I'm going to try some Mirai corn this year. Hoping it's really good as I got 1000 seeds! MY question is, How far apart do you plant the seeds. I read somewhere you should put 1 seed every 18 inches but that seemed kinda far. Any suggestions what works the best?

I planted mine a foot apart in circles of about 35 plants, I call them stalks.

The first ear I ate, a little young, was sweet and very tender, but not real 'corny'. It's getting older now, and the flavor knocks me out, love it! Very corn, very sweet. I put the pot on to boil, with a small spoonful of sugar, then go out to pick the fattest ears.

A shucking hint, pull off a few layers of the husk leaves, then divide all the rest at the top, including the silks, ripping off one whole side, then the other, silk and all. leave an inch or two of the stem for a handle.

Camera's broken or I'd post some photos.

Well, I'm anxious to try it. It's an experiment for me this year. I've read a lot of good things about it. Someone said that sometimes theres 2 ears for stalk. Do you find that to be true?

Yes, but I haven't tried any of the 'seconds' yet, letting them get a little bigger.

When I was a kid, or even twenty five years ago, (OUCH!) corn normally had two ears. Is that a thing of the past now?

I am just about to dig under the other two younger patches of thirty plants each, planted in a circle, because the first harvest was so disappointing compared to the Mirai. Some kind of Canadian super sweet I bought from Stokes.