If you’re getting through the long, dark days of winter reading the seed catalogs and dreaming of having your hands in the dirt, you may want to consider adding some new and visually exciting plants to your homestead landscape. Broom corn fits the bill.
Native to Central Africa, broom corn, (Sorghum vulgare) a variety of sorghum in the plant family Poaceae, is a beautiful addition to the garden: a plant with a diverse array of uses, both functional and ornamental. A hardy annual, broom corn, also known as broom straw, is a tall grass that forms broad, imposing tasseled, fan-shaped heads, ranging from 12-20 inches long.
Requiring a bright and sunny open location and flourishing in nutrient-rich, well-drained soil, broom corn reaches heights of 10-18 feet at maturity, depending on the variety. Unlike its cousin, sweet corn, broom corn produces attractive seed heads rather than edible ears.
Varieties Of Broom Corn
When shopping for seeds, you will find that there are three different types of broom corn: Western dwarf, whisk dwarf, and standard. Standard broom corn, the most popular and widely planted, grow the tallest and bear a brush from 12-36 inches in length.
流行的标准品种包括加州金色，黑色西班牙，也被称为黑色日本，和常绿。西方侏儒和扫帚侏儒是用于扫帚和壁炉扫帚的扫帚玉米类型，广泛用于插花。
Broom corn seed, in a wide range of colors, is available from local home and garden centers or can be purchased from heirloom seed dealers online. Popular varieties include Japanese dwarf, Moyer Jensen gold, white popping, Hungarian red, Texas black-seeded, Ramirez sweet chili, and Apache red.
Try several different varieties, the colors are bold and brilliant shades of red, brown, orange, yellow, black, and creamy white. The Texas black-seeded variety is especially attractive for use in floral arrangements when the seeds mature and turn a shiny, inky black. Birds love all varieties of broom corn seeds.
Purchase individual varieties of broom corn or plant Sorghum bicolor, a genetic name for a colorful mixture of multiple varieties of broom corn. Collecting the tasseled seed heads and drying at different stages of maturation will provide a beautiful spectrum of colors from any given broom corn plant.
Dependent on the variety, broom corn requires 90-110 days before it is mature, ripe, and ready for harvest. Broom corn will grow in any United States Plant Hardiness Zone climate that supports the cultivation of sweet corn. If field-grown, rows of broom corn can be planted as dividers between different varieties of field corn or sweet corn.
Tips For Growing Broom Corn
Broom corn is heat and drought-tolerant with a natural resistance to plant diseases, insects, and mold– it may be the easiest plant your have ever grown. Purchase seeds from local farm and feed stores, home and garden centers, or online seed sellers.
- Broom corn is best planted in late spring between early May and the middle of June after all chance of a late frost has passed. Broom corn does best in a full-sun location.
- Prepare the soil by deep tilling, removing all rocks, roots, and debris.
- 用大量陈年的草食动物粪便(牛、驴、骡子、马、绵羊、山羊或美洲驼)补充土壤。把肥料充分地放入土壤中，打破泥土的堵塞，直到土壤变成粉状。
- 播种深度约为1英寸，行间距为3-4英尺，行间距至少为2英尺。水好。
- Wide spacing ensures that each plant has plenty of room to mature. Broom corn thrives on lots of water, but the garden plot or field must be well drained to prevent root rot.
种植后，约一星期后，嫩绿的嫩芽便会出现。金雀花生长缓慢，直到长到1英尺高，然后它们似乎一夜之间就会迅速生长，一些品种的玉米可以长到15英尺甚至更高的高度。
As the plant matures and each group of plumes or tassels forms, but before it sets seed, gently bend the stalk over in a graceful arch, allowing the heavy seed heads to hang down naturally until harvest time.
Carefully shape tassels in mid to late-August for harvest in September before seed heads have a chance to mature. Lush and full pendant plumes make the finest brooms. If you forget to gently bend the stalks and plumes are left upright, they dry up on the plant causing the broom straws to splay and separate.
Although broom corn is a hardy annual it reseeds readily, quickly establishing in barren areas. Seeds spread by nature will likely sprout up too close to each other to allow the plant room to mature. Allow the most robust and vigorous plants to remain, weeding out the rest.
Harvesting And Drying Broom Corn
Broom corn is typically ready for harvesting when the plant has developed the ideal tassel or “brush” for broom-making. The hardy plant typically exhibits the best brush when the plant is still in flower and the seeds are only slightly developed. Planted in the spring, broom corn is ready for cutting by the harvest moon of October.
Each plume or brush is composed of a massive cluster of individual straws, joined together at the base of where each cluster meets the stem or stalk. A ton of dried broom corn tassels is enough to produce 80 to 100 brooms.
- A high-quality broom corn brush exhibits a rich, bright green colored stalk with tassels free from discoloration. Fibers should be pliable, smooth and straight. A standard household broom requires broom corn straw fibers that are approximately 18-22 inches long. Brushes that are bleached, overripe, coarse, or crooked are considered sub-quality.
- When it’s time to harvest broom corn, cut stalks with a sharp knife ormachete, leaving a long stem. Each stack is then hung upside down to dry or laid flat on drying racks. Drying time is approximately three weeks when stalks are hung in a warm, covered, well-ventilated space.
- When the tassels are used for broom-making, excess seeds can be removed by “combing” each tassel with a wide-toothed comb.
- Excess broom corn seeds can be saved for next spring’s planting.
Crafting A Traditional Broom Corn Broom
If you’re a fan of the Harry Potter movies, a fun tidbit is that a small artisan broom-making studio,North Woven Broom Co.of Crawford Bay, British Columbia, Canada handcrafted brooms for the marketing of the books. The broom corn straw they organically cultivate is from their lakeside homestead.
Here is an artist from North Woven Broom who gives us a glance into the process. Pretty neat, huh?
My cabin proudly boasts three of these brooms, a whisk broom, a fireplace broom, and a household broom. I had the pleasure of seeing the brooms made, attached to wind and sand-polished aspen driftwood handles I chose from the studio’s abundant collection of freshwater driftwood.
How To Make Your Own Broom
制作你自己的传统扫帚，每把扫帚在温水中浸泡两束10分钟，以方便处理。用皮带子把捆捆在把手上。在用皮革捆扎玉米扫把之前，先将皮革浸泡在水中，晾干后会缩紧，这样就能将稻草捆牢牢固定在扫帚柄上。
Secure with small copper nails, driven into each side of the handle at the area where the bundles and handle join. To maintain your broom in good condition, hang from a hook or store it with the broom bottom upright when not in use.
If the broom is stood with the broom end pointing down, leaning in the corner, broom straw tends to bend, damaging the visual appearance and usefulness of the broom.
Here is a great video that gives you an idea of what it looks like to craft your own broom:
A Bit About The History Of Broom Corn
尽管本杰明·富兰克林被认为是将扫帚玉米引入美国的功劳，但直到1787年，马萨诸塞州的农民利瓦伊·迪肯森(Levi Dickenson)用一捆扫帚玉米制作出了一种结实而性能极佳的扫帚，这种植物才开始流行起来。
Dickenson had some great ideas, but it seems it took him a while to implement them. Some 23 years later, in 1810, Dickerson invented a foot-treadle broom-making machine and commenced commercial production of his “new-fangled” household broom.
到19世纪30年代中期，商业扫帚玉米扫帚生产工厂在美国东北部各州如雨后春笋般涌现，并开始向西迁移。为了满足人们对金雀花玉米的巨大需求，每年都要种植成千上万英亩这种有利可图的作物。
In the mid-1970s, more than 100,000 acres of America’s heartland was dedicated to the production of broom corn. Today, broom corn is cultivated commercially throughout the Midwest, Texas, and Oklahoma.
Today, in homesteads across America, cultivating broom corn is gaining great popularity, as both an ornamental landscape plant and as an attractive, easy-to-grow, supplemental cash crop.
https://www.instagram.com/p/Bdk3Q4fjBfE/?tagged=broommaking
Broom corn, also known as broom straw, is an eye-catching ornamental plant, used as a flowerbed backdrop, against a fence line, or planted in staggered rows to hide unsightly views. By mid-autumn, broom corn exhibits brightly colored, giant seed heads.
The plant, sold fresh or harvested and dried in the fall, is always a sell-out at the farmer’s market, purchased by crafters for use in making brooms, whisk brooms, wreaths, and floral arrangements.
References
- Broom Corn, Washington State University Extension
- Alternative Crops Manual – Broom Corn, University Of Wisconsin Extension
- Broom Corn Production In Iowa, Iowa State University
Hello,
Great read, thanks!
I don’t have the room to grow that much sorghum for broom making… but do you happen to know where it can be purchased in Canada?
Thanks!