How to Monitor Growth and Identify Developmental Stages of Maize (Zea mays)

Properly characterizing the stages of corn growth is critical to conducting successful experiments in maize genetics and breeding. Specifically, accurately identifying stages of growth is required to perform developmentally dependent sampling or data collection, to predict time to flowering and seed maturation, and to allow for comparisons between different lines and populations based on developmental time. In this protocol, we summarize previous knowledge about maize development and describe how to monitor these stages in the reference inbred line B73, a yellow dent corn.