Zea diploperennis cobs Australia

This past summer I grew a perennial corn.  This one is Zea diploperennis x Zea mays, I believe it has been back crossed and contains roughly 85% diploperennis genes.   

I am told that pure diploperennis flowers under certain light conditions that are difficult to achieve in my climate, and that this cross means that it should flower at roughly the same time as domestic corn.  I am also told that crossing pure diploperennis with domestic corn is difficult, whereas crossing diploperennis with a percentage of domestic genes is much simpler.

This should mean that it should be possible to cross it with domestic corn and produce a perennial popcorn, or introduce other genes it has for disease resistance or cold tolerance etc into domestic corn.

Zea diploperennis

I had plans of crossing this with the very colourful glass gem corn, and hopefully produce a perennial multicoloured popcorn.  Unfortunately that did not happen this year.

This year the weather was odd, and many things in my garden didn't flower until very late.  The ears are not as large as they normally would be, but they still produced some seed and gave me an idea of what this plant can do.

Most of the ears were only about an inch or two long, and produced ten or so seeds.  My plants were grown in small pots of poor soil so I think double to triple this would be possible, which is still very small compared to domestic corn!

Zea diploperennis cob size

Zea diploperennis

Zea diploperennis flowers like domestic corn and appears to produce tiny little corn cobs about an inch or so long.  These have a few (sometimes only one) husk leaves that are easily peeled back, much like domestic corn.  

Unlike domestic corn, Zea diploperennis cobs are made of kernels only.  There is no woody ring or pith underneath the kernels.  Which means once you remove the husk, everything else can be crumbled into seed which is pretty cool.

I have no idea about the genetics of Zea diploperennis other than it being diploid.  The colour of the kernels seems to show some variation from white to yellow to brown.  I only started with a very small number if seeds, yet they seem to display a lot of genetic variation.

The plants themselves tiller somewhat, they are meant to be more cold tolerant than domestic corn yet are still frost sensitive, so I planted them in pots and moved them into an unheated greenhouse for the winter.  I have a feeling that this tillering habit should make it possible to divide any surviving plants in spring and hopefully share them around.

I am trying to send some seed to other growers in Australia to ensure that this interesting germplasm is not lost if something happens to my plants.

Perennial corn cob size

While I would love to cross Zea diploperennis with domestic popcorn I may never be able to achieve this as my climate is all wrong for perennial corn.  Or I may be able to lift the plants and overwinter in a frost free position.  Or I may be able to cover with mulch to protect them from freeze injury.  I really have no idea.  

I don't know how well these plants will overwinter in my climate even in my greenhouse, but I hope that they survive and are able to be divided into more plants in spring.  I don't have any extra seed this year as I plan to send all of my spare seeds to other growers who I know in different climates.  Perhaps one of them will be in the right climate and breeding something a little more useful from this will be simple.

Zea diploperennis size

I am told that the seeds from this can be popped like popcorn, or can be ground into flour pretty easily.  I am told that it makes a decent corn porridge.  I haven't tried any of this yet as I have so few plants and so few seeds.  I have no idea what it tastes like, or what the 'mouth feel' is like, as I am yet to eat any.

Given how simple it is to remove the husk, It would be easy either to leave it as is to store, or crumble it into seed.  From there feeding it to animals would be a simple matter of just feeding it out.  

If I lived somewhere with warmer winters I would like to grow a patch of this to feed to poultry.  I think this would function mt would be much like wheat or oats, but would be perennial.  Each winter the tops could be cut down for straw, but it would never need replanting.  This has potential to be a really useful permaculture crop.  Hopefully someone in a warmer climate grows this and can comment rather than me hypothesizing about it.

At this stage I think that this is more of a novelty rather than a productive vegetable.  Given that it can cross with domestic corn it has potential to use as a parent and breed some interesting things from it.  If I do have spare plants, or extra seed at some stage, I plan to list it on my for sale page.