Brittle Synthetic 2 (BTSYN 2) Hawaiian Supersweet Corn (Certified Organic)

Grown by Twin Oaks Seed Farm (VA) – 90 days – Zea mays

This corn is from the late James Brewbaker’s breeding program at the University of Hawaii, where Dr. Brewbaker spent over 60 years breeding corn – in challenging conditions and with few inputs – often growing three generations each year. It came to us through Jay Bost of Laughing Springs Farm, who studied with Dr. Brewbaker, and we’ve now grown it at Twin Oaks Seed Farm for two years. The “brittle” gene is responsible for the sweetness – Dr. Brewbaker felt that it performs better in warm and tropical conditions than the regular “SH2” supersweet gene. The flavor and sweetness are awesome, and the sweetness holds well. These are big, sturdy, disease-resistant plants, like field corn but with sweet corn ears. Dr. Brewbaker wrote about BTSYN 2 in a 1998 paper: “This synthetic is our best present genetic base for inbreeding, with a wide array of tolerances to diseases and pests.” Resistances include maize mosaic virus, rust, and fusarium among many others, plus good tolerance to earworms and lodging. We’ve noticed that it’s a lot easier to produce seed of BTSYN 2 and BTSYN 7 than other sweet corns because the kernels resist rot during drydown.  BTSYN 2 is a somewhat variable population, and about 20% of plants give multiple smaller ears instead of 1-2 regular ears. This is a great sweet corn for Virginia and the Southeast, and a powerhouse as a starting point for further selection and adaptation (we plan to keep selecting it!). We also got good feedback from a South Florida grower who tried it last winter, especially for its resistance to tropical earworms. 260 seeds/ounce.