There’s an old saying around here, Knee High By The Fourth of July, which pertains to the field corn. The farmers hope for the corn in the fields to be knee high by the Fourth of July. I think they made it this year! Not only did it surpass being knee high but it’s tasseling too! The corn is loving this hot humid weather. They don’t detassle much anymore but I don’t know anyone my age that hasn’t detasseld a corn field at least once in their youth. Dad was never going to allow me to detassle because he knew what went on in those cornfields between the teenage boys and girls but then my softball team contracted a field so he let me be involved since it was all girls. By the time we were done – I sure was wishing he’d said no! I think you either loved it or hated it and I definitely did not love it! It was hard, dirty work. I was short and couldn’t reach the tassles. It rained almost the whole time we were out in that darn field. We had a machine to ride but it got stuck more than it ran and we were constantly pushing it out of the mud. You’d go out first thing in the morning and have to walk through spider webs. The only positive about detassling corn for me was the money I made – I bought my own saddle! The next summer I worked at the local Tastee Freeze. I could make more money in a couple of weeks detassling than I could the whole summer working for Mort and Julie but I didn’t care. I loved working at the Tastee Freeze! But I still love looking at the corn fields.
We have that saying here in Central Pennsylvania as well! Our corn fields are always higher than the knee by the 4th of July!