Sat, Nov 07 2009
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Published August 21, 2007 04:28 am - There’s Amish man’s face in the Hudson sisters’ cornfield in Pierpont, but you’ll need airplane or helicopter to view it. Maze Craze Pierpont sisters choose Amish motif for corn field maze The Star Beacon There’s Amish man’s face in the Hudson sisters’ cornfield in Pierpont, but you’ll need airplane or helicopter to view it.
From ground zero, the gentleman’s eyes, hat and mouth all look the same, swaths through corn stalks higher than your head, stretching toward the August sky even as the multiple paths stretch your sense of direction. The Hudson Farm Corn Maze, advertised as the county’s first, is back for a second year. Sisters Sue, Pam and Rena Hudson have devoted the past three months to creating the face of an Amish man in the six-acre patch of field corn. Visitors have already started exploring this agricultural adventure, open daily through Oct. 31. Located on the family farm – the Hudsons’ father died in 1995 and mother in 2005 – the corn maze is an attempt to save the farm by re-inventing it. The sisters raise a few goats on the land and lease a portion of its productive acreage to David Holden, who planted the corn field in which the sisters created the maze. Because the corn must be planted in rows at 90-degree angles, more fertilizer and seed are required for planting a field destined to become a maze. The result is a lush, thick ocean of maize. “We have probably the best field of corn in Ashtabula County,” says Sue. The timing of the planting was perfect this year, giving the sisters almost enough time to remove the unnecessary corn by late June. Last year, they waited until too late in the season to start the task and ended up having to cut matured stalks. That involved hauling stalks long distances out of the maze. The work overwhelmed them, preventing the sisters from completing the covered-bridge design in one section of the field “There is more maze cut in there than there was last year,” says Pam. While they hired a company to produce that design, this year the task was taken upon by their nephew, Mitch Hudson. “We’re pretty fond of our Amish neighbors, so this is like a tribute,” says Sue Hudson of their design choice. She says Amish neighbors helped them last year with the huge task of hauling those corn stalks from the maze, and their Amish helpers returned to assist them again this year. “We had four Amish boys and an Amish girl helping us out,” she says. Mitch developed the design in April. The entire corn field was mapped out on graphing paper in five-row increments. “I spent two to three hours a day counting off the squares,” he says. “I put about 30, 40 hours in the design.” The design was transferred from paper to field by counting off rows and placing small flags where cuts were required. They started pulling corn when it was a few inches high. Clearing the paths early into the season created an issue they didn’t have to deal with last year: weeds and grass growing on the paths, requiring periodic mowing. Also, the bordering stalks saw the open spaces as invitation to branch out, posing yet another maintenance challenge. The sisters say this year’s maze is more complicated and challenging than that of 2006. Last year one of their friends cracked the maze in 55 minutes; this year, he was still wandering around after two hours. 
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