Row cultivation can help eliminate this problem. Cultivate while both weeds and sweet corn are small. Cultivation will not adequately control tall weeds and may cause considerable root pruning if the sweet corn is more than 18 inches tall. Insects Flea beetles are small, black, jumping insects which eat small holes in the leaves of young plants. They may carry and transmit the bacterial disease, Stewart's wilt.
Corn borers are white worms with dark heads.
First generation borers feed on whorl leaves during early summer, and later generations invade stalks, ears and ear shanks. Corn earworms are variably colored worms that feed mostly on ear tips. Protect ears with an insecticide from early silking to harvest. Soil insects include wireworms, white grubs, cutworms and seed corn maggots. They are especially troublesome on grassland to be planted to sweet corn.