SWEETCORN Golden Lion F1 

Sweetcorn – Golden Lion F1 is a mid-season variety of sweetcorn, producing super sweet, good sized cobs of a deep, buttery yellow. Each cob is filled to the brim with sweet, richly-coloured kernels that are bursting with flavour. Sweetcorn is wind-pollinated, so plant them out in blocks to ensure the pollination of all the female flowers. Poor pollination will lead to missing kernels in the cob rows. Sweetcorn – Golden Lion F1 will do well in most soils but are quite shallow rooted, so make sure to hand-weed rather than hoe around their bases. What could be better than the taste of freshly picked sweetcorn, steamed or barbequed with a little butter melted on top. As soon as they’re picked, the sugar content of the kernels starts to drop, so the stuff you buy in the supermarket really is no comparison. 

 

 

Grow your own 

 

Taste – sweet corn flavour 

 

Difficulty – Medium 

 

Sow - April-June 

 

Plant Out - June 

 

Harvest – July-October 

 

Seed Packet - Aprox 150 Seeds 

 

Sow indoors at 18-21°C (65-70°F) from mid-April to early May in modules or deep pots at a depth of 2.5cm (1in). For an extended cropping season, try early, mid season and late cultivars sown at the same time or sow your one early cultivar another two times, 3 weeks apart. In colder regions, early cultivars will do best. 

 

Sow outdoors in late spring. Soil or compost temperatures need to be above 10°C (50°F). Sow 2-3 seeds per station at 45cm (18in) intervals. Thin to leave the strongest seedling. 

 

Grow sweetcorn in a sheltered, sunny position, protected from strong wind, on a fertile garden soil. Add up to two bucketfuls of organic matter, such as rotted manure, and also rake in 100g per sq m (4oz per sq yd) of gerneral purpose fertiliser such as Growmore before planting. Plants are less successful on dry or heavy soil. 

 

As sweetcorn is wind pollinated, plants should be grown in blocks rather than rows, 45cm (18in) apart. 

 

Mulch with organic matter, to conserve moisture and suppress weeds and mound soil over the roots, which appear at the base of the stems. Hoe carefully as they are shallow rooted. 

 

Stake plants individually if they are tall or the location is exposed. Water well in dry weather when plants are flowering. Tap the tops of the plants when the male flowers (tassels) open to help pollination of the female flowers down below; poor pollination results in sparsely filled cobs.