Corn Rows quick and simple

    One of Rogers Rangers advances through a corn field I constructed for my Bloody Run scenario

One of the centerpieces of my Battle of Bloody Run scenario is the farm where Pontiac springs his ambush on the British force. I already had farm buildings and some scratch-built field stone walls. I even had some pigs to put in a pen. However, I thought I'd need a good corn field to make the table look that much nicer. I'd seen a threat on the Lead Adventure Forum about how to use the O scale corn stalks by JTT Scenery Products.

    A package of 28 corn stalks by JTT Scenery Products

Some posters on the thread were creating a one-piece field using the stalks. Others talked about basing them individually. I wanted to be flexible. Eventually, I want to do Native American style corn fields, which also incorporated beans and squash amidst the corn. I wanted to leave open the possibility of rigging something up like that. Plus, one giant field would be harder to store, while individually stalks sounded too fiddly. So, I hit upon the idea of basing 3 stalks up to a rectangular stand. They would be in rows so they could be used for settler's corn fields, but in small enough numbers per stand that maybe something could be rigged up to make it look Native American later.

    I drilled holes in each 40mm x 20mm base and forced a stalk into each hole, covering it with two-part epoxy

I took some 20mm by 40mm Renaissance Ink magnetic bases I had left over from my DBA days. I drilled three holes in each with a pin vice. This was easily the most time consuming part of the process. I was lucky in that my smallest drill bit for the pin vice matched the size of the stalks. I then forced the stalks into the hole, covering each with a blob of two-part epoxy to affix them to the bases.

    A raised row is created by drawing a line of white glue connecting the stalks and dipping it into a tub of ballast

Next, I grabbed each base and put a line of glue connecting the stalks. The base was then dipped into a tube of brown ballast to give the effect of a raised field row.

    A batch of corn row bases sit drying, waiting to be dipped into Woodland Scenics turf

Once dry, I painted the whole base with white glue. It was then dipped into Woodland Scenics brown turf and the excess tapped off. Once dry again, I put some dabs of white glue on the raised row and sprinkled it with Woodland Scenics blended grass. This makes it appear more like the corn stalk is growing out of the ground. Finish it off with Dullcoate and a sealant of 50/50 white glue and water, and they're finished!

    Another look at a quick and simple corn field costing a little more than $5!

The JTT corn stalks come 28 to a package, and are priced at $8.99 at Hobby Lobby. If you use the online 40% off coupon, that brings it down to $5.34 before tax. One package produced nine bases of three corn stalks each. Being on bases of three, I can rearrange them for whatever size and shape of cornfield I want to create. Definitely a quick and simple way to do a corn field!