Sunflowers: Tall Friends in the Garden of Life (Helianthus)

Bashful Sunflower

  To our tall friends in life and in the garden, I think there is nothing so stately as the sunflower.   They are way taller than my 63 inches and are one of the greatest cultivars in the garden or by the field-full!

  In Latin, flos solis (pronounced with the long O sound in both parts) has not only edible seeds for humans and foul but are produced for its golden oil used in cooking.  We have local farmers, who though not as showy as our Kansas cousins who plant by the mile, will plant a few acres in sunflowers. It gives fodder to the four-legged animals as well as attracting doves, cardinals and other songbirds in the back yard too.

 I learned something new today about sunnies; a common seed packet tells me to dead-head or cut off the spent blooms which produces more growth. I knew that about other annuals but not sunflowers.

 Being not exactly a farm girl, I learned that you have to wait until the seeds mature in the plant and dry, before you can replant them.

 The sunflower seeds are hidden beneath that wonderful cushion of tiny symetrical rows that you see on the face of the bloom itself.  Once the head begins to mature or dry on the stalk, those little protective pieces can be chipped off by birds or hands and then you can pull the vertically stored seeds out for roasting and eating, or for leaving on the head for the birds.  When this starts occurring in August, I will scrape some off and show you what treasures lie beneath!  You will be amazed if you have never seen it.

  With drying seeds, do it on something paper until they are completely dried...several days of drying or you will lose your entire next year's seed crop to mildew and rot if you put it into a plastic bag prematurely. (Ayup, been there done that). 

 The beauty of annuals that reseed is that they theoretically can be a perennial (ones that return year after year without replanting) because they drop their seeds and some do regrow.   To help with seed stock, I have several friends that trade in the long days of winter; why pay $3 for ten seeds when you can trade with a friend and get a hundred for free?! It gives us fellowship around the table, talking about the long days of summer that we are longing for!

  In the garden of life, being a shorter person have I always had to be on the front row of any kind of group picture and so one time, I thought to ask a tall friend what is is really like being tall.  She is taller than most men and though not ashamed of her height she does not exactly like to stick out of the pack, either.  She said that people naturally gravitate to her to make decisions and ask directions of her which can be presumptuous and sometimes annoying. 

  I would like to have that view for awhile but, I will maximize being a snap dragon in the row.  Somebody has to fill that part!

  I took her a few of my sunflower seedlings one year to remind her that she is such a sunny person and we all love seeing her head above the crowd!