Everything you need to know about baby corn cultivation, growth and production. Learn about:- 1. Introduction to Baby Corn 2. Origin and Distribution of Baby Corn 3. Composition and Uses 4. Climate and Soil Required for Cultivation 5. Sowing Time 6. Manurial Requirement for Cultivation 7. Irrigation Requirement for Cultivation 8. Intercultural Operations 9. Harvesting and Yielding 10. Varieties.
Contents:
- Introduction to Baby Corn
- Origin and Distribution of Baby Corn
- Composition and Uses of Baby Corn
- Climate and Soil Required for Cultivating Baby Corn
- Sowing Time of Baby Corn
- Manurial Requirement for Baby Corn Cultivation
- Irrigation Requirement for Baby Corn Cultivation
- Intercultural Operations of Baby Corn
- Harvesting and Yielding of Baby Corn
- Varieties of Baby Corn
1. Introduction
to Baby Corn:
Baby corn is an herbaceous warm season monocot annual grassy plant, which is monoecious with male flowers borne as the terminal inflorescence (tassels) on the main stem and female flowers borne separately as lateral inflorescence (ears) developing at leaf axils. A single plant produces one to several ears. Baby corn is the young tender ear of specific group of maize plants harvested before fertilization when silks have just emerged.
Baby corn, a form of maize, is quite nutritious and most popular salad vegetable in United States and Western countries, where its delicate ears canned in 2% citric acid are imported from developing countries, mainly from Thailand, which is the largest exporter of canned baby corn in the world.
Earlier its cultivation in India was limited to only big cities to fulfill the demand of only five star hotels, but now being new salad vegetable crop, it is becoming very popular especially among the progressive farmers of Delhi, Meghalaya, Western Uttar Pradesh, Haryana, Maharashtra, Karnataka and Andhra Pradesh.
Its cultivation would help in diversification of vegetable based cropping system for suitable agriculture and would be profitable, as it would fetch remunerative price both from Indian and foreign market. Canning industry has made the baby corn an industrial crop in many countries of the world, thus, there is a big scope of exporting baby corn de-husked canned ears to the western countries.
2. Origin and Distribution
of Baby Corn:
Maize (Zea mays) has been considered a food crop of great importance in the western Hemisphere, and perhaps garnered from the wild millennia before being domesticated. It was found at Tehuacan cave excavations in Mexico about 5000 B.C., and the domestication is estimated to have begun about that time, however, the commercial cultivation began nearly 200 years ago in the US. America is said to be the native place of maize, and Zea mays var. mexicana is its progenitor.
The early Americans spread this crop from southern Mexico to Argentina and Canada, and later, Columbus took it back from the New World to Spain, and within an era, it spread all over the world. Baby corn (Zea mays var. saccharata synonym rugosa) is originated recently. The word corn, which is a generic term for a grain or cereal, is commonly used in the United States, Canada and Australia, thus, the name corn is applied to the new grain species found in Americas.
3. Composition and Uses of Baby Corn:
Composition:
The edible tender cobs of baby corn is a good source of proteins, lipids, and pro-vitamin A, being light yellow in colour. White and yellow cultivars contained more sugars, oils and proteins than the yellowish brown cultivars, however, the yellowish brown cultivars contained more β-carotene than the yellow and white cultivars, and the white cultivars had the least β-carotene content, thus, light-yellow color tender ears are comparatively more nutritious.
Its tender cobs are sweeter in taste and the most important thing is that the ears of baby corn are completely free from pesticides residues since the ears are tightly wrapped with several layers of husk, thus, its consumption is absolutely safe. Its nutritional value given below in Table 25.1 is comparable with other major vegetables preferentially consumed in India on large scale.
The compositional analysis shows significant difference in various properties among different fractions of dent corn and popcorn. Mean granule diameter of the starches separated from different fractions ranges between 6.33 and 13.64 mm, and starch granules shape varies from oval to polyhedral. Baby corn starch shows the presence of oval shape granules, whereas, other types of corn starch granules have polyhedral shape.
Amylose content of starches from different corn types ranges between 15.3 and 25.1%. Baby corn starch shows lowest swelling power, solubility, amylose content and mean granule diameter. The turbidity of the gelatinized aqueous starch pastes from all the corn types increases with the increase in storage period. Baby cornstarch shows the lowest and popcorn large grain fraction shows the highest retro-gradation values during storage.
Uses:
The stem-like de-husked, light yellow colored sweet and tender ears of baby corn are used as salad vegetable by slicing and adding lime juice and pepper powder either alone or along with raw onion and tomato. It is potential ingredient for mixed vegetables, vegetable biryani, and Chinese food preparations. Besides, soup and pickle made from baby corn are other value- added delicacies in big hotels and airlines. In China, a kind of food called Manchurian is prepared from baby.
In addition to significant nutrition, baby corn provides diversity to meals because of its crispy texture and flavor. Its green plants, which contain protein 13.2%, fat 4.4%, fiber 34.8% and ash 6.5%, form a balanced fodder for cattle, thus, baby corn production provides opportunity to the farmers to develop dairy industry for the diversification of agriculture.
4. Climate and Soil Required for Cultivating Baby Corn
:
Baby corn can be grown under a wide range of agro-climatic conditions but the plants grow well and exhibit maximum potential at a temperature range of 25-30°C. The crop will not perform well when the temperature goes above 35°C or below 16°C, and the plants are easily killed by frost. It requires at least 65-75 frost-free days from planting to harvesting.
The seeds require a soil temperature above 12°C to germinate. For the germination of seeds the optimum soil temperature ranges from 21° to 27°C, and at this range, the seeds take 2-3 days to germinate, however, low temperature delays germination. Seed decay and poor stands often occur at low temperature due to the attack of soil pathogens such as Pythium, Fuscirium, and Penicillium species.
Being a crop of tropical origin baby corn is chilling sensitive, and can suffer photosynthetic depression and chilling damage at temperature below 5°C. Most of the baby corn cultivars show little growth and yield loss if plants are exposed to prolonged periods of temperature below 12°C.
The mean air temperature 24° to 30°C is optimum for growth, but the maximum dry matter is accumulated when the day temperature exceeds 19°C and the average night temperature 13°C. Cool nights are important particularly near harvest, slowing maturation rate and extending the time at which the cobs have maximum quality characteristics.
Low atmospheric temperature affects the growth and development adversely, and high temperature during cob formation leads to quality deterioration of cobs due to their fast growing rate and change in texture. Baby corn being tolerant to cool temperature is the only summer vegetable crop, which is handled as a cool season crop to preserve quality of harvested produce.
Baby corn being C4 plant is best adapted to high light intensities since low light conditions due to high planting density can impair ear development. Although the rate of plant development is primarily determined by temperature but since it is a quantitative short-day plant, photoperiod can potentially influence the leaf number and time of flowering.
Short days tend to reduce leaf number and accelerate emergence of tassels and silks. Some of the cultivars do not form ears in temperate region until the day length decrease to 12-14 h; the tropical types keep their vegetative phase continued. The day length less than 8 h and temperature below 22°C can also delay flowering.
Cultivars bred for long days and cool temperature yield less when grown under warm temperature and short days. A temperature above 35°C is usually supra-optimal for photosynthesis and can impair reproductive development and reduce ear quality. The optimum growing environment for maximum productivity is one with warm days and relatively cool nights.
Baby corn can be successfully grown on all types of well-drained soils that are suitable for the cultivation of sweet corn, however, its cultivation is not possible in saline and alkaline soils as it suffers with abiotic stress in such soils right from germination to the end of crop. A well- drained sandy loam or loam soil having a pH of 6.0-7.0 with adequate organic matter is considered ideal for raising a healthy crop of baby corn.
Baby corn although requires irrigation at frequent interval but water stagnation in field affects the plant growth adversely. Hence, the soils with adequate drainage facilities are strictly desirable. Wet soil conditions will increase the incidence of seed decay, resulting in poor stand of crop, thus, provision for drainage should be made for Kharif crop. The field is prepared to a fine tilth by repeated ploughings and followed by planking.
5. Sowing Time
of Baby Corn:
Baby corn can be grown successfully round the year under irrigated and mild growing conditions, especially in central, southern and western parts of India, while under rain fed conditions, it’s sowing would be ideal during the onset of south-west monsoon (June-July) or north-east monsoon (September-October).
In northern plains of India, the sowing can be done from last week of February to the middle of September, and in hilly tracts depending upon elevation and atmospheric temperature March onwards is the best time for it sowing. Early sowing is important in obtaining early harvest. Successive sowings are made to provide a steady supply of baby ears to the processing industry. Short duration and long duration cultivars can also be sown at the same time to provide a regular larger harvest.
Maize sown in July was unsuitable for baby corn production because late season growing conditions (reduced moisture, high temperatures) resulted in poor seed germination and growth, while sowing dates earlier than 19 June had no significant effects on yield. Significant cultivar x sowing period interaction for all the characters indicates the need to evaluate cultivars in different sowing periods since the performance of the cultivars is significantly influenced by the sowing date.
The seed rate varies with sowing time, soil fertility, irrigation facilities and the variety or hybrid used for cultivation. In comparison of field or sweet corn, a high density of plants per unit area is recommended to get higher yield from baby corn, thus, relatively a higher quantity of seed is required.
A quantity of about 25-40 kg seed is enough for the sowing of a hectare of area. Fungicide treatment of seed is essential particularly when sowing is done in wet soil, however, most seeds sold commercially are treated with a mild fungicide to prevent the root rot disease frequently occurred in plants at seedling stage.
The plant density depends upon the soil fertility, growing season, irrigation facilities, and the varieties used. For grain purposes, the plant requires more nutrients and light energy to synthesize and supply more metabolites to cobs for the development of kernels; it is, thus, essential to maintain proper spacing among plants to reduce the competition for light, space, nutrients and moisture.
On the other hand, baby cobs harvested before the development of kernels require less metabolites, hence, a very high plant population density (1,11,000 to 1,65,000 plants per hectare, depending on variety, climatic condition, and soil fertility) is maintained to obtain economic yield.
If irrigation facilities are not available, initial plant density should be reduced to minimize interplant competition. The baby corn seeds are sown 2.5-4.0 cm deep in flat beds at a spacing of 30 cm row to row and 20 cm plant to plant during spring summer and on ridges at a spacing of 45×25 cm for rainy and late sown crop. In rainy season, it is mandatory to raise the crop on ridges to avoid water logging near plant root zone for better root respiration and ions uptake.
The analysis of variance shows that plant densities significantly affect all the traits except for plant height and weight of husked ears; increasing plant density from 87,500 to 2,37,500 plants per hectare generally increases commercial ears yield, however, in field trials, Faiguenbaum and Olivares (1995) found that stand density had no significant effect on yield per unit area, plant height and cob length or weight but increasing density significantly reduced cob size and yield per plant of baby corn cv. Sweet Boy.
The baby corn cv. Early Composite gave highest green fodder yield at 40 x 10 cm spacing, whereas, it gave the highest (1.74 t/ha) mean ear yield, the highest net returns per unit area and net returns per rupee invested at a spacing of 40 x 20 cm, however, Kotch et al. (1995) observed that all the cultivars produced higher yield at 10 cm plant spacing. Sukanya et al. (1999) reported that a spacing of 45 x 30 cm increased all the growth parameters, resulting in the highest baby corn yield (29.62 q/ha).
Sahoo and Panda, (1999a; b) obtained highest baby corn yield (harvested just after emergence of silk) and net profit in both seasons at 40 x 20 cm spacing. The hybrid 27A x 31B had the best performance at a plant density of 55,000 plants/ha for husked and dehusked ears yield, while the 27A x 29B hybrid was better at 1,10,000 plants/ha, taking the same traits into consideration.
6. Manurial Requirement
for Baby Corn Cultivation:
The quantity of manure and fertilizers depends upon the soil fertility and the variety/hybrid used for cultivation. Especially the hybrids grown in soils having low fertility require more quantity of manure and fertilizers to express full yield potential. At the time of soil preparation, about 12.5 tonnes of farmyard manure per hectare should be incorporated thoroughly into the soil. The activated sludge cake, chicken manure, and chicken + rice bran compost gave the highest yield of baby corn.
For a healthy crop, a quantity of 75 kg nitrogen, 60 kg phosphorus, and 20 kg potassium per hectare has to be applied. Full dose of phosphorus and potassium and half of nitrogen are applied as basal dose just before sowing, and the remaining half of nitrogen is given 25-30 days after sowing as top dressing. Where heavy fertilizer applications are advised by soil test, split applications are always beneficial.
The response of baby corn plants to nitrogen depends on the source of nitrogen supply, its time of application and amount of rainfall. Heavy rainfall leads to a great loss of nitrogen by way of leaching; this loss of nitrogen in regions of heavy rainfall can be curtailed by applying nitrogen in the form of ammonium or in split doses.
Placement and amount of fertilizers can affect the germination adversely if placed too close to the seed because closer application may cause injury to seed or germinating seedlings. Thus, a fertilizer mixture of N, P, and K is applied at the time of sowing by band placement on both sides of seed rows keeping 5 cm apart. Nitrogen and potassium fertilizers cause more injury as compared to phosphorus fertilizer.
Baby corn does not have a high requirement for trace elements but light soils may be deficient in micronutrients and at higher pH levels particularly in light soils, the trace elements including B, Zn, and Mn may be inadequate for normal plant growth.
Use of excessive doses of potassium can also create a nutrient imbalance, affecting availability of several other elements. Baby corn is susceptible to zinc deficiency and shows deficiency symptoms like broad bands of white or light yellow patches with reddish veins along the midrib.
Sometimes, the seedlings soon after sprouting start developing interveinal chlorosis followed by white necrotic spots, and finally, the affected seedlings are died. Zinc deficiency is very common in soils of northern parts of India. The deficiency of zinc in baby corn can be overcome either by basal application of zinc sulfate @ 15-20 kg/ha or spray of zinc sulfate @ 3 kg + unslaked lime 1.5 kg/ha dissolved in 625 litre water or 2-4 sprays of 0.3% ZnSO4 at 10-12 days interval starting from the appearance of first deficiency symptom.
Application of nitrogen through organic and inorganic sources exerted a significant effect on the growth components, yield attributes (including number of cobs per plant, cob length and cob weight), cob yield and Stover yield, however, application of N through organic source either farmyard manure or poultry manure coupled with nitrogen 135 kg/ha was found to be economically optimum for cv. CoBC-1 in the western zone of Tamil Nadu.
The yield of baby corn (harvested within 1-2 days of silk emergence) increased significantly with increasing nitrogen rate up to 150 kg/ha, whereas, cobs with husk and green fodder yield increased significantly up to 200 kg N/ha, and nitrogen 200 kg/ha applied in 3 equal splits gave the highest baby corn yield, net return (Rs. 48481/ha) and net return (Rs. 1.44) per rupee invested.
The number of baby corn per plant increased from 2.1 to 2.7 with the increasing levels of phosphorus, and the highest yield (1491 kg/ha) was obtained with phosphorus 35 kg/ha, however, the highest net profit (Rs. 16,400) was observed with the application of phosphorus 26.2 kg/ha.
Application of potassium 50 kg/ha in 3 equal splits as basal dose and at 15 and 30 days after sowing resulted in the highest values for plant height (237.1 cm), leaf area index (4.16), dry matter production (13.61 t/ha), number of cobs per plant (3.63), cob length (18.33 cm), cob width (3J6 cm), cob yield (5.36 t/ha), Stover yield (20.50 t/ha), nitrogen (185 kg/ha) and K uptake (139.5 kg/ha), and crude protein (12.98%) and vitamin C content (12.46 mg/ 100 g) of baby corn.
Application of nitrogen 120 kg + phosphorus 26.2 kg + potassium 50 kg/ha gave the highest baby corn yield (1634 and 1491 kg/ ha in the winter and wet seasons, respectively) and highest net profit, however, the fertilizer use efficiency was highest with nitrogen 20 kg + phosphorus 4.4 kg + potassium 8.5 kg/ha.
7. Irrigation Requirement
for Baby Corn Cultivation:
Possessing C4 photosynthetic pathway baby corn has relatively high water use efficiency, and being shallow rooted crop it is not tolerant to drought conditions, hence, regular supply of irrigation, which encourages the production of ears, is as important as total amount of water. Supplemental watering is essential where rainfall is insufficient during the growing season. Short period of water stress, especially at ear initiation and development stages, reduces the yield drastically.
Flooding is also very injurious to corn plants since it causes stalk rot and reduces plant height, ear development and ultimately, the yield, thus, water logging conditions should be avoided, especially in Kharif season. First irrigation may be given soon after sowing if the soil at the time of sowing is deficient in moisture.
Subsequent irrigations should be given at 7-10 day interval without any break so that the moisture in soil may always remain at normal state and the crop may not be subjected to moisture stress at any stage. The critical stages in baby corn for irrigation are seedling, knee height, and flowering stages.
The yield, total water requirement, and crude protein percentage were higher when irrigation was scheduled at IW : CPE ratio of 1.0 during summer and Kharif season.
Plant height and dry matter production increased with soil moisture regime of 1.00 IW/CPE ratio coupled with application of 150 kg N/ha, and the number of cobs per plant, young cob yield (5074 and 4855 kg/ha during summer and Kharif, respectively), Stover yield and crude protein were highest with irrigation scheduled at 1.00 IW/PE ratio along with N at 150 kg/ ha, however, no significant effect was recorded on vitamin C content; the total water used was highest under irrigation at IW/CPE ratio 1.0 but the water use efficiency was highest at IW/CPE ratio 0.50.
8. Intercultural Operations
of Baby Corn:
Weed control is achieved either by manual hoeing or by the use of weedicides. In early stages, hoeing is essential to suppress the weeds. If hoeing is not done for some time due to unavoidable circumstances caused by continuous rains, the early weed growth may become a serious competition for space, light, nutrients and moisture with crop plants.
The first hoeing is done 15 days and second 25 days after sowing; the plants are top dressed with nitrogen 75 kg and potassium 20 kg/ha before second hoeing and earthed up to avoid lodging of plants. Using Alachlor 50 EC @ 5 litre/ha within 2 days of sowing in 200 litre water as pre-emergence herbicide can control grassy as well as broad-leaf weeds. Application of Simazine or Atrazine @ 2-3 kg/ha in 750 litre of water as pre-emergence also keeps the field weed free.
A process of removing male flowers (tassels) before shedding of pollens is known as detasseling, which is considered to be the most important and mandatory operation to prevent pollination. Since the cob of baby corn, an immature female inflorescence, is harvested before fertilization, thus, removal of female flowers before the release of pollens is essential. This operation is also useful in making the harvesting early.
The plants generally start bearing tassels 40-45 days after sowing and keep continue for next 8 to 10 days. This process is essentially done to avoid fertilization, which causes hardening of grains, thus, this operation is done to maintain the tenderness of cobs. The kernels get developed, individual kernel becomes hard, and quality gets affected adversely if pollination and fertilization are allowed.
Different types of corn should not be sown together in nearby fields to avoid landing of foreign pollens from side cornfields on silks of baby corn. Plant detasseling increased baby corn yield by 6.2- 8.9% but reduced the green fodder yield; detasseling also resulted in an increase in baby corn weight, regardless of sowing period, however, the effect of detasseling varied with the cultivar and sowing date.
9. Harvesting
and Yielding of Baby Corn:
The ears become ready for harvesting 47-50 days after sowing. Picking of cobs should be started from the day of silk emergence for fresh market and 2-3 days after the emergence of silk in the ear shoot before fertilization, or when the silk attains a length of about 1.3 cm for processing purpose.
Silk emergence and cob size are the varietal characters; it is, therefore, difficult to judge the right stage of picking cobs in different cultivars. The stage of harvesting is very critical, because a single day delay in harvesting of cobs deteriorates the quality of cobs and degrades the market acceptability.
It is, therefore, advisable to assess the right size of young cobs by organoleptic test at first picking and later by visual observation and pressing the cob to assess the size of cob inside the wrapped husks. To determine harvest maturity the husks are not disturbed but the external appearance is used.
The number of days to maturity is not a good index. Baby corn responds well to warm temperature; the warmer the temperature the faster the baby corn grows and matures. In general, baby corn is harvested as and when the cobs attain a size of 8-10 cm long, 1.0-1.5 cm diameter, and 7-8 g weight.
The baby ears should be picked every day early in the morning, since the texture of ear changes very fast; during morning hours, the cobs keep the moisture content high and atmospheric temperature remains low, which saves cost and time needed for pre-cooling soon after harvest. If harvesting is done in daytime, it is essential to remove the field heat immediately.
The cobs are harvested using secateurs to avoid mechanical injury. Care should be taken during harvesting the ears to avoid damage to the stem and the leaves. A total number of 6-7 pickings can be done in crop duration of 65 days. Crop duration of a cultivar may increase or decrease depending upon weather conditions during growth and development.
When baby corn was held in open air, after dehusking and silk removing before packing, the appearance of fungi increased with increasing holding time and the soluble solids content and dry weight of baby corn decreased during storage at all temperatures.
Meenaphan et al. (2003) discussed the role of desiccation in browning development of baby corn after harvest, and correlated browning development with weight loss and total phenolics but not with phenylalanine ammonia-lyase and polyphenol oxidase activities.
Therefore, the followings post-harvest operations should be done as early as possible:
Pre-cooling of cobs nearly 0°C soon after harvest as possible helps in the retention of maximum quality during marketing since baby corn often gets heated after harvesting, especially when loaded in trucks for transportation to the cannery, and the load may stand overnight due to long distances.
Under such situations, the quality deteriorates very fast, thus, prompt handling and cooling of baby corn is needed to preserve its best quality. The temperature of ears immediately after harvest should be lowered to 10°C by immersing into ice water soon after harvest to maintain the ear quality, since low temperature reduces the rate of respiration, moisture loss, and degradation of taste and quality of ears.
Merely 2% moisture loss may cause visible reduction in quality of ears because of shriveled appearance. Water having a temperature about 5°C is the best and cheapest means to precool the husked or de-husked cobs. In this method, the entire cob gets uniform cooling and restores the lost firmness and appearance due to absorption of moisture during precooling.
Hydro-cooling at 5°C hardly requires 13 minutes to reduce the temperature at the center of cob from 18° to 11°C. However, refrigeration requires 5 hours to reach a temperature of 11°C in the center of cob. To prevent spreading and reduce post-harvest diseases from mechanically damaged cobs to all the cooled cobs, it is recommended to use chlorine either in the form of sodium hypochlorite or calcium chlorite @ 100-150 ppm as disinfectant in chilled water.
After precooling, the cobs are de-husked manually and subjected to grading. The grades include ears of baby corn with uniform color characteristics and freedom from various types of injury. These grades are highly subjective and require considerable skill and experience.
The factors that are important for grading are the size and undamaged surface of cob, and other factors that may be evaluated from a sensory point of view are appearance, diameter, color, tenderness, sweetness, and aroma of the ear.
The ear quality should last for a long period and impart a sweet taste. Based on ears length the cobs are graded either manually or mechanically as large (10-13 cm), medium (7-10 cm), small (4-7 cm), and mixed damaged. In lot of each grade, the mixture of other grade cobs should not be more than 5%, otherwise it will spoil the market acceptability of whole lot.
Baby corn before shipment is generally packed in moisture retention film bags, with the husk removed after precooling. The film should be perforated to prevent development of off-flavor inside the package during transportation. These ears filled in perforated film bags are further packed into well-ventilated plastic crates.
The size and number of film bags per crate depend on market requirement. Baby corn should not be handled in bulk unless iced because it tends to heat up the whole pile.
Baby corn quality decreased during storage in perforated plastic bags at 5°C for 0, 1 or 2 weeks before canning in 4% salt solution, and became darker in colour, poorer in texture and an off-flavour was detected, particularly in those stored for > 7 days.
Dos-Reis et al. (2003) detected filamentous fungi and yeasts and psychrotrophic microorganisms on minimally processed baby corn treated with calcium lactate and ascorbic acid and held in plastic packs for 12 days but found no Coliform bacteria.
Among tropical crops baby corn is different concerning its harvested portion; the plant is sensitive to chilling temperature but not its ear, and is optimally stored at near 0°C temperature to slow down the respiration rate and to maintain quality.
Low temperature also reduces the conversion of sugar to starch; the sugar loss can be 4 times higher at 10°C than at 0°C, and this loss one day after harvesting can be 80% at 30°C, 3 days after 50% at 10°C and 4 days after 20% at 0°C. After cooling, capping with ice is desirable during shipping or holding to remove the heat of respiration and maintain husk freshness.
Storage of baby corn ears for more than 4 days even at 0°C leads to serious deterioration and loss of tenderness and sweetness. It is highly perishable due to its very high rate of respiration; thus, it must be refrigerated continuously, and must be kept as close to 0°C as feasible; otherwise all previous efforts may be quickly negated. Baby corn packed on a Styrofoam tray covered with 20 nm thick PVC film stored better at 3°C than at 1° or 5°C.
The yield varies with soil fertility, growing season, irrigation facilities, and cultivar being grown. In general, early maturing hybrids and composites gave higher yield than late-maturing ones. With adequate irrigation facilities, the hybrids on an average give 7-10 quintals per hectare husked with a recovery 15-20% de-husked tender cobs and 250-300 quintals per hectare green fodder, which can be fed to the domestic animals or ploughed in the field as green manure.
10. Varieties of Baby Corn
:
Although any cultivar of sweet corn can be used for the production of baby corn in kitchen gardens but for commercial purposes a variety with special characteristics is required. Earliness is the most important characters to catch early market. In spite of short duration early maturing, hybrids and composite give higher yield of better quality ears with uniform size than long duration open pollinated ones, and are uniform in maturity.
Earliness also helps the crop to escape it from several biotic and abiotic stresses usually appear at flowering. Kumar and Kalloo (2000) also described early maturity, prolificacy, synchronized ear emergence, and yellow kernel as the most important attributes that make the maize genotypes suitable for baby corn production.
Even an ideal plant of an open pollinated cultivar for grain production at the most gives two cobs per plant with bold size kernels. However, for baby corn production an ideal plant should bear at least three cobs per plant without losing quality (size, shape, and sweetness).
Baby corn of yellow color having good row arrangement of medium size (6-9 cm length and 1.5 cm diameter) is considered most acceptable in the markets, thus, hybrids producing yellow cobs are ideal for baby corn production. The height of an ideal plant of a baby corn hybrid should not be more than 2.5 m because optimum plant height reduces the cost of harvesting, as it requires less labour to harvest the cobs.
The cultivars of baby corn recommended under Indian conditions are Golden Baby (hybrid), Parkash (hybrid), MEH-114 (hybrid), Kesari (composite), COBC-1 (synthetic) and VL-42 (open pollinated).
The detail descriptions of the varieties are given below:
The Pro-Agro Seeds India limited New Delhi developed this hybrid. Its plants are medium tall (2.25-2.5m) and fast growing. Each plant produces 2-3 uniform-sized (8-10 cm long) ears. The tender ears to be ready for harvesting take 47 days after sowing, and their harvesting continues for 8-10 days. The plants are tolerant to Turcicum leaf blight. Its plants about 1,11,000 per hectare may be accommodated to obtain good yield.
The hybrid Parkash gave an average baby corn yield of 15.5 q/ha, which is 23.2% higher than the baby corn yield of 14.2 q/ha recorded for Kesri, which gave the highest baby corn yield among composites. Parkash also gave higher values for ears per plant (2.65), ear length (9.3 cm) and ear girth (1.45 cm) than the other genotypes. The highest yield of this hybrid may be 18 q/ha.
It produces on an average 2.3 ears per plant. The cv. Kesari has a yield potential of about 14.2 q/ha having an average ear length of 7.5 cm and girth of 1.4 cm and 2.3 ears per plant.
It is a composite culture developed at the Department of Millets, Centre for Plant Breeding and Genetics, Tamil Nadu Agricultural University, Coimbatore. It was developed by crossing UMI 836 with pollen from UMI 836-1 and UMI 836-2 and selecting plants with multi-cob and making intense between 50% of the selected progenies as female and rest 50% as male progenies using selected progenies.
Best performing lines were pooled and the unit composite constituted. Under irrigated condition, it can give a tender cob yield of 6,600 kg/ha, while under rain fed conditions, it gives 2900 kg of husked cobs per hectare. The cobs have standard size of 9-10 cm suitable for export market.
The hybrid MEH-14 and the open pollinated variety VL-42 have been developed by the Directorate of Maize Research, New Delhi. Both are early, produce multiple and uniform ears, which have properly developed ovule rows. Verma et al. (1998) reported that among 26 maize cultivars grown at densities of 1,00,000 or 1,25,000 plants/ha, the hybrid VL-42 yielded highest baby corn of 2.57 t/ha at both plant densities.
The other cultivars of baby corn are YBC-705, ITC-Zeneca and C-6, and ML-66, CML-91 or Across-8930, Kolhapur, and US Baby Corn; five hybrids- Parkash, JH3021, JH3425, JH3459 and JH3037; 2 composites- Kesri and Megha with early maturity; 3 hybrids- Paras, Sartaj and JH1387, and 4 composites- Parbhat, Partap, Pearl Popcorn and Madluri with full-season maturity.
The cultivar DKB 929 showed the best performance for husked ear weight and baby corn weight. HM4 developed at CCS Haryana Agricultural University Hisar is also a very high yielding variety of baby corn.