April is an ideal time for one of the last vegetable sowing jobs of the spring, and a new one on me, sweetcorn.
Sweetcorn, as it turns out, is not really like many other plants in terms of how it grows, how it pollinates and how you harvest it.
Corn, while grown across the world today, is native to central America and has been grown by the native Americans alongside other vegetables for thousands of years across what is today Mexico and the USA. It was the descendants of those native Americans who, during An Gorta Mór in Ireland, sent corn and meal to help feed those facing starvation and malnutrition. Some of that food aid was stored off the main road between Malin Town and Carndonagh.
The corn I’m sowing is a variety called Golden Bantam from a packet of organic kernels I picked up at the Organic Centre in Rossinver, County Leitrim last autumn.
