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Corn plant spacing depends upon your row width.

Tom Bechman 1, Editor, Indiana Prairie Farm

May 18, 2015

2 Min Read

How do you know if your planter did a good job of singulation and spacing corn kernels? If you have a Precision Planting 20/20 Seed Sense monitor or similar type monitor from someone else, you should know singulation and have a pretty good idea of whether you spaced correctly before you ever left the field – in fact round by round after round. Of course, the real proof is when the stand emerges.

Related: Do Your Corn Rows Have That 'Picket Fence' Look?

Even Bob Nielsen, Purdue University Extension corn specialist, gives leeway for some errors and kernels not emerging or turning into seedlings for various reasons.

picket_fence_corn_stand_should_look_like_1_635671976986937354.jpg

In the first place, 95% emerge listed as warm germ on many seed tags means that if you plant 32,000 kernels, in theory under the best of conditions 300, 400 will emerge. That's one reason why he says a standard deviation of 2.0 is about the best you can hope to achieve in terms of plant spacing.

Standard deviation refers to the amount of variation if you measure distance between plants in one/one-thousandth acre in several parts of the field.

According to the Purdue University Corn & Soybean Field Guide, here is what spacing between plants should be at various row widths and population goals. For 30,000 seeds per acre in 30-inch rows, the expected spacing is 7.0 inches per plant. At 34,000 kernel drop, it's 6.1, and at 32,000 it's 6.5 inches.

If you go narrower, row spacing between plants within the row increases. At 32,000 plants per acre in 20-inch rows, for example, it's 9.8 inches per row. If you're in 15-inch rows and at 32,000 plants per acre, the spacing should be 13.1 inches between plants.

Related: Will Narrow Row Width Boost Corn Grain Yield?

Note that the number for spacing in 15-inch rows is basically double the spacing between plants within a 30-inch row. You are spreading plants out within the row and making the row spacing narrower.

From the corn hybrid you select to the seeding rate and row width you choose, every decision you make influences the size and scope for corn yields. Download our FREE report: Maximizing Your Corn Yield.

About the Author(s)

Tom Bechman 1

Editor, Indiana Prairie Farm

Tom Bechman is an important cog in the Farm Progress machinery. In addition to serving as editor of Indiana Prairie Farmer, Tom is nationally known for his coverage of Midwest agronomy, conservation, no-till farming, farm management, farm safety, high-tech farming and personal property tax relief. His byline appears monthly in many of the 18 state and regional farm magazines published by Farm Progress.

"I consider it my responsibility and opportunity as a farm magazine editor to supply useful information that will help today's farm families survive and thrive," the veteran editor says.

Tom graduated from Whiteland (Ind.) High School, earned his B.S. in animal science and agricultural education from Purdue University in 1975 and an M.S. in dairy nutrition two years later. He first joined the magazine as a field editor in 1981 after four years as a vocational agriculture teacher.

Tom enjoys interacting with farm families, university specialists and industry leaders, gathering and sifting through loads of information available in agriculture today. "Whenever I find a new idea or a new thought that could either improve someone's life or their income, I consider it a personal challenge to discover how to present it in the most useful form, " he says.

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