What does baby sweetcorn meant to look like?

Welcome to Goy Debbie! Only joined meself a few days ago and can't keep up with it all!

Not sure of the answer to this but if you go to my photo's, you will see my mini sweetcorn plants it is now. The roots are really strong and when planted, it was about 5" tall and on the verge of pegging it but along with my garlic - the only 2 edible things I've planted as Ali does the veggies - it has grown beyond my own height of 6' 1"....

The label says it crops late summer early autumn which is a pity as I've already used the mange tout in several stir frys! Still, the plant is fantastic as a plant on it's own - very architectural. Good luck with it anyway. Wonder who will crop first?? lol!

carrots I felt seem to take forever when I was growing them with my daughter. It is a lot of foliage on top, you could have a gentle poke in the soil to see whats happening. How long have they been growing for?

sweetcorn ive never tried but have been reading up and can only really find this info but am sure someone can try to help on here.

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Baby corn is a cereal grain taken from specialized corn (maize) plants and harvested early, while the ears are very small and immature. Baby corn ears are hand-picked as soon as the corn silks emerge from the ear tips, or a few days after.
Home gardeners can grow and harvest baby corn by harvesting the tiny ears on regularly planted corn. Any variety will work. Plant corn seed much closer together than usual - sow each seed about four inches apart in the row. Keep the row spacing to the normal 30 to 36 inches apart. Baby corn ears are best harvested when they are two to four inches long and one-third to two-thirds of an inch in diameter, whether grown with a regular or close spacing pattern.

To harvest baby corn at the perfect time takes practice. You might need to harvest a few at different stages each day for a few days to learn exactly when the baby corn is at the perfect stage for you. Start by harvesting ears where silk appears that day. Each ear may reach this stage at a different time on each plant, so you'll have to watch your plants closely.

Also, corn grows so quickly, that timely harvest is crucial. In an extra day or two, the corn can grow larger than you might like for baby corn, giving a tougher and larger ear than might be good in a stir-fry dish or salad.

I've grown baby sweetcorn. The 'grass' will get to about 5ft tall before it does anything exciting!! Have you got it in the ground or in pots? It really needs to be in the ground to produce. Baby corn is just imature sweetcorn that you harvest really early, before the cob fills out so you need to be vigilent to catch it in time. Finally, you'll get a big tuft on top of each plant which is what produces the pollen, but since you harvest babycorn before it is pollenated, this is of no consequence.

I have to say, I love bought babycorn, but my homegrown crop tasted terrible!!! I've never bothered with them since!! Hope yours turns out better lol

I'll just add, the babycorn grows in the leaf axils - that's the nook inbetween a leaf and the stem where they join. The corn will be heavily sheathed with leaves and you need to pulll the lot out and pull off the sheath to reveal the cob.

That's good to know. Thanks Sid. I love the baby corns in stir frys but Ali's not so keen on them.

Very good of her to buy me the plant though. Be nice if they turn out okay but will let you know....

Thanks everyone for your input. My Baby Sweetcorn are in tubs and no where near 5ft tall. It is only about 12". We do not get alot of sun in our yard.

My carrots in the pot next to it and they are ok a bit small but again no sun at all hits our back.

They would be happier in the sun if you can manage it Debbie....

Mine is currently standing at about 6' 6" tall so should hopefully crop soon!