Claire got a message from Mike and Sue who were apparently driving through or by a corn field. I guess that inspired them to wonder how high the corn should be since it\u2019s getting close to the 4th of July. Naturally they asked that Claire pass the question along to me \u2014 the smart uncle.<\/p>\n
There are a lot of \u201cold adages\u201d that have been passed down through generations. One of those old adages that is still in circulation today is that corn should be \u201cknee high by the Fourth of July.\u201d Besides being kind of a cool rhyme, it was probably somewhat accurate at the time the phrase was coined \u2014 probably back in colonial times. Actually there is really no clear explanation as to where, when (or why) the rhyme got started.<\/p>\n
When I was growing up a lot of the farmers around Maysville grew corn, even though the \u201cnext town over\u201d was considered the broomcorn capital of the world<\/em>. (You can check the archives of this blog if you don\u2019t know what broomcorn is\u2026) But I remember corn being about 18 to 24 inches high by around the first of July. So \u201cknee high\u201d was probably pretty accurate. However I noticed driving around Shepherdstown this week that all the corn was a lot higher than \u2018knee high.\u201d<\/p>\n There\u2019s actually a good scientific reason for this \u2014 back when I lived in Maysville, if the corn crop had gotten as high as you knees by the 4th, it meant that the crop was doing well, and the farmers could plan on a good harvest. But today, the corn farmers plant isn\u2019t like the corn the farmers around Maysville planted. The genetics of corn have improved tremendously in the past 70 or 80 years. Corn (and other crops) is much more stress tolerant. That toughness has allowed the corn to be planted earlier in the spring \u2014 sometimes it I can even be planted in less than ideal conditions. I think the knee high phrase is still popular, but the phrase \u201ccorn as high as an elephant\u2019s eye\u201d may be more accurate today. (The elephant\u2019s eye phrase originated in the Oklahoma<\/em> musical as part of the lyrics from \u201cOh What A Beautiful Morning.\u201d There\u2019s a bright, golden haze on the meadow. The corn is as high as an elephant\u2019s eye and it looks like it\u2019s climbing up to the sky.) To put this in perspective for you, according to Google, the average size of an elephant is 10 feet tall. So today, a corn stalk\u2019s growing success is held to a much different standard.<\/p>\n While I was doing my extensive research for this blog, I ran across one theory that claimed that the \u201cknee high\u201d rhyme came about during colonial times and meant knee high by the 4th of July to a man sitting on a horse. Of course this begs the question, how tall of a horse? I think horses are measured in \u201chands\u201d so that complicates things even more.<\/p>\n So today, knee high by the fourth of July isn\u2019t a good thing but it\u2019s got a nice ring to it and it\u2019s fun to say. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Claire got a message from Mike and Sue who were apparently driving through or by a corn field. I guess that inspired them to wonder how high the corn should be since it\u2019s getting close to the 4th of July. … Continue reading
\nSo because of the improvements made to the corn, if the crop is only<\/em> knee high by the 4th of July, that\u2019s not a good sign \u2014 it\u2019s a bad sign.<\/p>\n
\n\u2014 30 \u2014<\/p>\n