What's wrong with my corn?

[random]

Any corn growers maybe can offer some advice?

I've got several "patches" where my corn seems to be dying. I can't see anything to suggest anything consistent, including location in relation to irrigation (I was thinking possibly overwatering). I don't see any pests. The patches are across several rows, maybe about 5-6 feet of each row, in a couple of spots. Any ideas?

Here's some of the stuff growing well:

You can see the dying stuff in the background there. Here's some closer pics

As you can see - right next to some growing well

I'm having a very similar problem with my beans too, although the patches are smaller:

Potatoes, onions, peppers, tomatoes, etc - everything else looks fine, only corn and beans. Any ideas?

 

[bird dogger]

Any corn growers maybe can offer some advice?

I've got several "patches" where my corn seems to be dying. I can't see anything to suggest anything consistent, including location in relation to irrigation (I was thinking possibly overwatering). I don't see any pests. The patches are across several rows, maybe about 5-6 feet of each row, in a couple of spots. Any ideas?

Here's some of the stuff growing well:
View attachment 60015

You can see the dying stuff in the background there. Here's some closer pics

View attachment 60016
As you can see - right next to some growing well
View attachment 60017

I'm having a very similar problem with my beans too, although the patches are smaller:

View attachment 60018

Potatoes, onions, peppers, tomatoes, etc - everything else looks fine, only corn and beans. Any ideas?

Not being familiar with your soil and its makeup, from the pics I'm almost thinking it might have suffered from a touch of cold weather as in frosty mornings. It's kinda supported by the condition of the other plants shown.

Have you sprayed any grass killing herbicides that could have drifted into the corn rows? Over watering, maybe but the other (beans?) don't show signs of that.

Lack of nitrogen in the corn will turn the leaves yellow.

Here's a chart showing some corn deficiencies:

Without more details, a best guess is your crop has been touched by some frost? I've had that happen a few times. Corn is pretty tough and should turn out ok.

Have you dug up any of the plants to look at the root system to rule out any insect/nematode damage?

 

[bird dogger]

If you google sweet corn frost damage and look at the pics, you'll see similar pictures ranging from very light damage to complete destruction. But without knowing more......it's still just a guess. Hopefully, it'll turn out ok.

 

[GeoHorn]

toss some ordinary sulfur out there and till it in next time. Doesn’t take much.... 15 lbs per acre.

 

[ayak]

What did a soil test indicate, as far as pH and N-P-K are concerned?

 

[BAP]

Having raised thousands and thousands of acres of corn over the years, my first assessment without seeing the bigger picture of the rest of the field, knowing soil conditions, nutrients, herbicides used now and past, would be too much water for too long. Flooding of the corn for too long will kill it like that and too much water in general will leach away the nutrients needed. To save what is left and perk it up , I would put some urea down just before the next rain. Much of the stunted light green corn in the pictures look like it is lacking nitrogen.

 

[Chinook3]

It also needs some air. Cultivate the soil!

 

[bucktail]

Cut worm or root worm of some sort? The good plants seem too close to the bad plants for it to be drainage or nutrients.

 

[random]

Thanks for all the feedback!

I'll admit to not knowing the nutrient content, I didn't do a soil test this year. As for aeration - this was recently tilled, just before making the rows & planting. Flooding was my first thought but I have two problems with that conclusion: 1) the rows slope (a change since last year when everything DID flood) and 2) the healthy and unhealthy ones are too close, and the distribution doesn't suggest that at all. (Still watching out for it though). Won't hurt to put out a couple more gauges to see if there's a difference in incoming water between those areas.

Didn't think of frost. I don't think we've gotten quite that cold, but we did have a couple low-40s nights not long ago, so maybe it got down to the danger zone. I would have expected the peppers to suffer from that too, but the corn IS in the most exposed part of the field, peppers much less so. Soil-borne pest looks like another good candidate, I'll do some digging.

Again, thanks for the pointers!

 

[BAP]

Any herbicide use on that spot or nearby this year or past years?

 

[random]

Any herbicide use on that spot or nearby this year or past years?

in the rows between. sprayed pretty carefully, small stream.

if this is herbicide related, it's a new pattern to me.

 

[Tornado]

After looking at the pictures my first gut reaction was either herbicide or frost. It could be disease, but the fact that healthy plants are sitting right next to dead ones is interesting. I know we have had a very mild spring here in florida. Just this past weekend we had 47 degrees and 48 degrees on saturday and sunday morning, and I measured temps sitting there from about 3:00am to 7:30am both mornings, so several hours. Weather forcast was for lows to only be 51 or 52, but my weather station, which is a good quality set up, measured several deegrees colder. My neighbors also verified 40 degree temps across the whole county. Needless to say it is stunting my watermelons and cantaloupes in my garden noticeably. That is really unusual for us here for May 15/16, to have temps going into 40's for hours at night. I got a late start on my garden, but its almost work out to be a blessing this year that I was late planting everything. Potatoes are the first item typically planted in gardens here, and most folks try to get them in mid to late February. I didn't get mine in until late march or so - several weeks behind others in my area. In April, i forget the day without looking back at my weather station data, we had a period of frost, and it bit some of my potatoes. It bit several leaves on one plant and then left the plant next to it alone. It was just cold enough to frost a little, and it only bit a few select plants. It looked similar to your corn here, but the potatoes handle frost pretty well, so I just lost a few leaves on these plants - the plants powered on, but some other plants, had I had them in the garden, it would have killed them. Its pretty uncommon to frost like that in Florida in April. People already have melons in the ground in april here.

 

[random]

There's even healthy plants between bad ones.

Didn't see anything in the ground. Soil is moist but not wet 1-1/2 to -2" down. Most of the dying ones appear to really be dying - leaves are dry and crackly.

COULD be from when I sprayed, but if so I sure didn't see how it happened. Nozzle was low to ground, kept it between the rows. That's a LOT of overspray to do that kind of damage.

Either way, looks like about half of it is gone.

 

[BAP]

What did you use for spray?

 

[random]

Glyphosate, same as usual.

 

[BAP]

Is it Roundup resistant corn? Is it possible you got some on the corn? Only takes a couple of drops to damage non-resistant corn.

 

[random]

A couple different types, at least one is heirloom so definitely not in that case.

I can see a little bit of damage from a gust or overspray, but this seems a bit much:

I may have slipped once or twice but that looks like I just sprayed the entire field.

Like I said, at this point I'm writing it off, but hoping I can figure it out for next time...

 

[sheepfarmer]

A couple different types, at least one is heirloom so definitely not in that case.

I can see a little bit of damage from a gust or overspray, but this seems a bit much:

View attachment 60232

I may have slipped once or twice but that looks like I just sprayed the entire field.

Like I said, at this point I'm writing it off, but hoping I can figure it out for next time...

Glyphosate can be transported with water to the roots of nearby plants and taken up there to kill the plant. So maybe rain after spraying was the culprit, without overspray.

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5606642/

If you were planting sweet corn and your patch is a reasonable size, one pass with a mechanical weeding device, such as a scuffle hoe, might be enough to let the little corn plants get a head start. After that they seem to do ok without a totally weed free environment.

Johnny's Seeds sells a variety of tools from mini hand push tillers to flame throwers that might not be as risky as glyphosate.

Alternatively if you plant your rows to accomodate your tractor, maybe you could pull a cultivator, or to allow a rototiller to go down once.

 

[random]

Interesting - that's not something I've encountered before. I don't THINK rain/water was an issue at that time but I don't remember clearly enough to dismiss it. Definitely something to keep in mind, thanks for sharing.

 

[random]

FAULTY SPRINKLERS!

My son noticed a pattern I hadn't seen and asked if the sprinklers were supposed to turn full circle. I checked, and the three that were set to full circle were still hitting the limit clips, even though the "tab" was up.

Doesn't explain all of it, but explains most of it.

Obviously, not very happy. But at least figured it out before losing everything.