Corn in Farmstead World — crop in the game, and what it is on a real farm.
Corn, or maize, is a tall grass native to Mexico that farmers have bred for thousands of years into the familiar yellow ear.
It is one of the most productive grains on earth: most field corn feeds animals or becomes fuel and sweetener, while only a little is eaten as sweet corn.
Farm facts about corn
Corn was domesticated by Indigenous peoples in southern Mexico about 9,000 years ago from a wild grass called teosinte. (en.wikipedia.org)
Wild teosinte 'ears' hold just 5 to 10 seeds in stone-hard cases - nothing like a modern corncob. (en.wikipedia.org)
Teosinte seeds are armored so hard they can survive a trip through a grazing animal's gut - which helps the wild plant spread. (en.wikipedia.org)
Some corn varieties carry up to 20% of their DNA from a second teosinte species, picked up through natural cross-breeding over thousands of years. (en.wikipedia.org)
Teosinte weeds in Mexican corn fields evolved to mimic corn plants so farmers wouldn't pull them - a phenomenon called Vavilovian mimicry. (en.wikipedia.org)
The genus name Zea comes from a Greek word for a completely different grain - possibly spelt. (en.wikipedia.org)