2025 Community Grow Out
Astronomy Domine Corn
This is your page for everything related to the 2025 Community Grow Out:
The Details
Our choice for the 2025 Community Grow Out is the Astronomy Domine Corn, bred by Alan Bishop in Southern Indiana. It is not a true-breeding ‘variety’ but is considered a ‘landrace’ with looser genetics giving it the flexibility to adapt specific locations. This is what helps make it surprisingly robust, adaptable and easy to grow in our northern climate.
We have up to 100 participant seed packages available and we’ll walk you through how to grow this unique corn for fresh eating and save some of the seed so you can enjoy it year after year.
All we ask for in return is for you to share your experience with us!
How to Report:
We look forward to hearing about your results.
Please use this link to fill in our online form
Here is a printable sheet for you to keep your records on during the season
Other ways you can share with us:
You can post on Instagram using #2025CGO (be sure to tag us @okanagan_seed_savers)
You can email your photos and comments to okanaganseedsavers@gmail.com
There’s no limit to how many times you can share. The more the merrier!
Data to collect for reporting:
Site description (soil type, sun exposure, watering regime, plant layout/spacing, etc.)
Number of ears harvested for fresh eating
Number of ears harvested dry
Total weight of seed once removed from cobs
Any other observations or interesting info you collected through the season.
How to Grow
Corn is relatively easy to grow. Provide it with lots of nutrition and water and it will do the rest!
Attributes of a good corn site:
Full sun exposure
Rich, well-amended soil - add some finished compost or well-rotted manure if necessary
Block-type area - corn does best when planted in a square ‘block’ instead of one long row
Enough space for 1 foot (30 cm) between plants within a row and 2 - 3 feet (60 - 90 cm) between rows
Easy access to irrigation - corn requires regular watering
May-June
Direct-sow seeds in a block at the spacing described above
Option: seed at 6 inch (15 cm) spacing and thin young plants to 1 foot (30 cm).
Option: seed two smaller blocks 2 weeks apart to extend fresh harvest window
Water regularly and watch them grow!
July-September
Harvest some cobs for fresh eating at the ‘milk’ stage
For more information on how to detect that CLICK HERE
Make sure to leave some cobs for seed!
It is best to save single cobs from multiple plants instead of several cobs from the same plant in order to maintain better genetic diversity
How to Save
Saving your corn seeds is the easiest part!
All you have to do is:
Let some of your cobs dry on the plant
Harvest dry cobs in late September or early October, pull back the husk and leave in an airy indoor space
the garage or storage shed is a great place
Once they have fully dried (another month or so) twist the seeds off the cobs with your hands
if this is still really hard, let them dry some more and try again later
Weigh out your seed haul and Report Back
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