A.
I must state that last year was my first garden in the Santa Fe area and
I now have a better appreciation of problems with insects that live in the soil,
such as cutworms, and other insects that live on the aboveground parts of corn
plants. I expected and accepted the battle with cut worms and lost about
one-third of my three-inch corn plants. Grin and bear it - replant and use a
little Bt (Bacillus thuringiensis) as recommended in Extension Publication
#1300.
After success in getting stalk size and the formation of ears, I had great fun watching the bees work tassels and silk forming on each ear. Somewhere, years ago, somebody said their Grandpa used mineral oil on the silk of each ear to keep a moth from laying the ear worm. I squirted every ear on about 100 feet of corn. I had good healthy worms, with no excretion problems.
Harvested corn ended up about two inches shorter after I cut off the ends. One of my friends suggested I cut off the silk to eliminate the laying area of the moth. I am not sure if he was taking advantage of a Master Gardener Trainee. Don't try my failures, but be careful of the bees if you use a synthetic insecticide like Sevin by applying very early AM or late PM when our friends are asleep... Better yet, use Bt which is not harmful to honey bees.
About half way through my battle with worms, something started taking the low ears off and having a picnic under a big cedar tree. With a Hav-a-Hart trap and catfish bait, my scoreboard reads nine possums, two raccoons, one skunk and three cats. All of the above have new addresses.
I just planted my '99 sweet corn crop and will try to be friendly with Mother Nature and share only a small part of my crop.