Sunflowers are large, lively, cheerful flowers and adding them to your landscape will certainly bring a smile to your face. The brilliant flowers can be found in many colors including traditional yellows and newer pinks and shades of red. Sunflowers are easy to grow and offer a long season of colorful bright flowers. The seeds are very useful and can feed wildlife and humans alike. Sunflower oil is also made from sunflower the seeds. The larger variety of sunflower becomes so tall that they make for an exciting maze or hid-out for kids of all ages!   Sunflowers come as annuals or perennials. There are two main varieties: the dwarf and the larger variety. The larger variety can become as tall as 10 feet whereas the dwarf variety is usually around two feet.

Requirements:  

Sunflowers are easy to grow and can be found in many varieties to ensure flowers all season long. Sunflower’s requirements include lots of sun, lots of water, support and room to grow.  If sunflowers do not receive enough sunlight, the flowers will stretch to reach the sun and require additional staking. Sunflowers do not tolerate cool weather well, so be sure to plant after all risk of frost is over, usually sometime in May. If you are planting from seed, plant at least two feet a part as sunflowers need plenty of room to grow and require a lot of nutrients. Once sunflowers are planted and growing, they do not transplant well, so choose your location carefully.  An additional consideration to remember for planting is that a sunflower’s “face” will follow the sun so select an appropriate sight.

 Traditional, tall-variety sunflowers do get top heavy and staking them for support might become necessary, especially if planted in a windy location. Another option is to plant them so they have support from an outpost such as a fence, gate or outdoor building.

Germinating

If you are growing sunflowers from seed, one simple step to help ensure you grow strong plants is to germinate them and select the seeds that germinate first. These are usually the strongest plants. Germination involves three easy steps:

·       Take a couple of plates and dampen some paper towels. Place towels on plates.

·       Put the individual seeds between the damp paper towels and place on the plates.  Place in a sunny location.

·      Check the paper towels daily to make sure they are consistently damp (not wet!). The seeds that germinate first will usually make the strongest flowers. Some seeds may not germinate at all; If this happens throw them out.

 Sunflowers reach maturity between 75-110 days and seeds can be harvested at this time. Near the end of the season when other flowers have little to offer except spent blooms, your sunflower seeds are ready to be harvested! You will know your sunflower seeds are ready to harvest when the back of the heads are brown and dry.