Harvests of Corn Earmark Holiday : Agriculture: Fourth of July weekend means high demand for golden grain at roadside stands.

In the great Midwestern corn belt, farmers are happy if their crop is “knee-high bythe Fourth of July.” But in Ventura County, growers want their sweet corn piled high in the market and ready to eat by that date.

“People really want it now,” said fifth-generation farmer Phil McGrath, who grows corn on his 300-acre farm near Camarillo. “The Fourth of July is the initiation of summer corn season, and when we have it ready by then, it sells like candy.”

To be ready for harvest in July, farmers plant their corn in March. Some stagger the planting of their fields so that they can pick a fresh crop every week until November.

Farmers try to meet the high demand during the Fourth of July weekend and then end their season with high demand around Thanksgiving, McGrath said. They plant hybrid varieties of corn, with names that boast of their bountiful flavor, like Super Roadside, Golden Jubilee and How Sweet It Is.

Despite the lines at roadside stands for the grain, corn accounts for only $2.5 million in gross receipts, a drop in the bucket for the county’s $800-million produce industry, according to a Ventura County Agricultural Commission report.

Even so, McGrath said he makes a healthy income from the 10 acres he plants with corn each year. He sells his organic corn direct to customers at his roadside stand in Camarillo called the Central Market and at farmers’ markets in Ventura, Santa Barbara and Hollywood. If he sold his corn wholesale to big grocery chains, he probably could not stay in business, he said.

As it is, many of his customers are corn connoisseurs who eagerly anticipate the start of the season, McGrath said.

Stuart Thomson, 50, a teacher who lives with his three sons in Simi Valley, said he was waiting when the first crop of fresh white corn was harvested for sale at the Tierra Rejada Family Farms roadside stand in Moorpark.

“You know the season is starting when you can see the yellow tassels on the corn,” he said.

For the last couple of weeks, Thomson said, he would drive by the fields next to the roadside stand to check on whether the corn was ready. When the market finally hoisted its flags with ears of corn on them this week, Thomson came in and started stuffing a bag with the fresh crop.

“This is so much different from the junk you buy in the store,” he said. “It was picked today. The sugar content is real high, and it tastes tremendous. It’s like the stuff you might get out of your back-yard garden.”

Across the street from where Thomson picks up his corn is the Valley Farms stand. It is surrounded by rows of tall, green corn topped with their golden tassels. Inside the stand, bins packed with white and yellow corn picked only hours earlier wait for hungry customers.

Next door, field workers pack ears of corn--also harvested that day--into crates that are sold at a wholesale market in Los Angeles and to street vendors. The farm managers planted the crop so that a fresh crop will be harvested every five days for the next five months.

“We plan it very carefully,” said George Boskovich Jr., the farm’s owner. “We have people waiting for it. It’s sort of a kickoff to summer. When people go to a supermarket they might get something that’s really . . . blah. They’re ready for something they can buy that was picked that same day. It tastes better.”