It's that time of year again. As twitter lights up with planting posts, and the season clock gets ready to start, we're looking at where corn tillers fall in the timeline.
When can I expect to find tillers in my field? Where in my field are they most likely to show up?
Both excellent questions, and we're out to find answers. In this post, I'll lay out some of what we've seen!
When to expect corn tillers.
Due to the morphology of corn plants, IF tillers appear, they will start showing up between V5 & V7 (fifth to seventh leaf stages). (The significance of this is discussed in The corn conundrum post.) This was confirmed in all of our locations in 2019, as tillers began appearing around or slightly after V5. After V7, the appearance of new tillers is unlikely if the canopy is able to close.
Where to expect corn tillers.
Based on what's discussed in the All the right ingredients post, we can see that several factors play into tiller development in corn fields. Major factors in the field that encourage tiller development include areas with weak or low stand, fertility hot spots, and general borders/field edges. Growing point damage (by hail or high winds, for example) to plants in early stages also can encourage tillering as a stress response due to hormonal shifts in the plant.
To summarize, if you're on the lookout for tillers in your fields, expect them: When? around V5 - particularly after early damage events and Where? low stand areas, field borders, and known fertility hot spots.