How to Keep Earworms From Eating Your Corn

You wait all season for it — you peel back the husk on a perfect-looking ear of corn, and there it is. A worm, already chewing through the tip. Corn earworm is one of the most destructive corn pests around, and once it's inside the husk, there's almost nothing you can do about it. In this episode, we walk through a practical six-step guide to stopping corn earworm before it ever gets that far — from choosing resistant varieties and considering Bt corn, to post-harvest tillage, monitoring moth activity, treating the silk channel at exactly the right moment, and rotating products to avoid resistance. Every step is built around one key fact: this pest is nearly untouchable once it's inside, so prevention and timing are everything. In this episode: Why corn earworm is nearly impossible to treat once it's inside the husk Choosing resistant varieties and Bt corn Why post-harvest tillage protects next season Monitoring moth activity and knowing when to act The critical silk-stage treatment window Avoiding insecticide resistance through rotation Follow Farming Forward for more episodes on the tools and ideas shaping the future of agriculture across Asia.