Harvesting field corn

Harvest is the most expensive field activity in the production of corn for grain. The timing, duration and the way the harvest is carried out have a direct bearing on corn quality, yield and especially grower’s profit.

Field corn is harvested after the plants died and turned a light yellow beige. The ears are hard, dry and dented and usually start to hang down from the sides of the plants.

Ears of field corn are harvested by machine that strips the matured ears from the stalks. If harvested in wet weather corn may have to be dried before it is stored. The tine of harvesting is quite critical and is usually about 18 days after silking.

Usually, it is allowed to dry on the stalk in the field is harvested and stored in small roofed bins or silos with metal or wore mesh walls

Combines in the industrialized world incorporate the ear packing, husking, shelling and cleaning process into one machine. The cobs, husks and stover are left in the field.

Much of the corn storage is done on the farm, since most of the corn crop is used as feed for animals.

Stalks and leaves may be harvested, chopped, and placed in the piles or in silos to form ensilage for animal feed. Stalks and leaves also be chopped and returned to the soil for humus.
Harvesting field corn

Type of corn in United States

The United States is the world’s largest corn producer, accounting for about 40 percent of world production. The Corn Belt stretches across the heartland region, including the top produces Illinois and Iowa, as well as Indiana and portions of neighboring states.

Many type of corn are grown in the United States. Sweet corn is produced as a vegetable and eaten fresh, canned or frozen. Sweet has kernels that are easily recognized by their wrinkled exterior. The sweetness is the result of genetic defect in metabolism that prevents the sugars in kernel in from being completely transformed into starch.

sweet corn

Sweet corn is grown mainly in the northern United States. Popcorn is also used as a food. However the type of corn most utilized in the United States and considered as a grain rather than as vegetable is field corn.

There are number of varieties of corn usually classified as starchy or waxy, depending in the characteristics of a carbohydrate present.

The many varieties of corn can be classified into six major types based predominantly on the different characteristics of the kernels: dent, flint, flour, sweet, pod and popcorn.

American grow more dent corn than any other type and it is important for livestock feed.

Corn does best in areas with ample moisture, fertile soil, and warm nights.
Type of corn in United States

Field Corn

Corn (Zea mays L.) or maize, as it is known in Europe and other part of the world originated in the western hemisphere. In the United States, most corn is field corn. A kernel of field corn consists of 66 percent starch 2-4 percent oil and the reminder mainly cellulosic material.

Although it is now grown around the world, production of field corn in the United States exceeds in any other country and is usually about equal to that of the rest of the world put together. Field corn is primarily used for animal feed.

Currently, less than 10 percent of the United States field corn is used for direct domestic human consumption in corn based foods such as corn meal, corn starch and corn flakes, while the remainder is used for animal feed, exports, ethanol production, seeds, and industrial uses.

Field corn is entirely different as a food crop from the sweet corn that is harvested immature in summer and cooked fresh on the cob or cut from the cob in food plants and preserved by canning or freezing later consumer us as a vegetable.

Field corn is allowed to mature before harvest in the fall. It is shelled as a part of the harvesting operation and typically requires drying on the farm before storage or delivery to country elevator, grain terminal, or mill.

There are two basic strains of field corn, Flint and Dent. Flint corn is the hardier and harder of the two and has less starch. Dent corn is softer and is the variety that is usually grown for flour.

A very small part of the field corn crops of white corn varieties are used in foods as the chief ingredient in masa and lye hominy, while corn meal sold at retail, the grits being use as vegetable menu item or hot breakfast cereal, and the meal for making white corn bread and muffin.

Much field corn is used as feed for animals on the farm where it is grown but far larger amounts are manufactured into mixed feeds by formula feed manufacturers, feedlot operators and the like.
Field Corn