On Thu, 12 Oct 2006 Mike Lyle wrote:

Why do you want non-hybrid sweetcorn?

So I can save the seed and get the same variety for the next year!

I don't think it would work; as I mentioned before, I think all
sweet
corn, like all our cereals, is the product of hybridisation.

I don't think this is universally right Mike. I know that some of the
old forms of sweet corn can still be bought (at least in Oz) but I
don't know how they'd go in a cooler UK growing season (although given
that many UK gardeners seem to have access to tunnel houses etc, then
that should help it grow. The firm mentioned below has a range of
corn including Bali and Anasasi corn
http://www.edenseeds.com.au/content/main.html

When I said "hybridisation", I didn't mean recently: as far as I knew,
the recognisable ancestor arose in prehistoric times, and there wasn't
a true species in the wild. In the absence of our botanist, Stewart
Robert Hinsley, I've Ggld up a scientific article, which shows I'm
wrong, but partly right!
http://sciencecareerst.sciencemag.or...revious_issues
/articles/3290/ancestors_of_science_prehistoric_gm_corn
or
http://tinyurl.com/trxog

It's very interesting if you like that kind of thing: if I may dare to
summarise, maize does have a single wild ancestor, called teosinte, but
it doesn't look like maize. The ancestral mutation wasn't a hybrid,
though all our forms are its hybriid descendants, and it did suddenly
come about in prehistoric times. There was once a view that "Indian
corn" came from extinct ancestors, but that's been shown to be wrong by
modern genetic studies.

In any case, the big objection to the plan is Nick's, reinforced by
you: the virtual impossibility of ripening seed in the British climate.

My two penn'oth: It *is* possible to ripen sweetcorn seeds in Britain
because I've done it. Some ten years ago now, but I certainly did it. I
can still remember how fiddly it was to detach the dried seed from the
cob! However the resulting plants the following year were a little
disappointing as the cobs weren't as large nor as sweet. I don't think
the original seed I bought was an F1 but it was clearly a hybrid. And
bearing in mind that sweetcorn is different to agricultural maize, I
suspect that all sweetcorn is hybrid.

But it shouldn't stop anyone having a go. You never know what you'll
get!

David
--
David Rance http://www.mesnil.demon.co.uk
Fido Address: 2:252/110 writing from Caversham, Reading, UK