Sunflowers are gorgeous, and I don’t think I have ever met anyone who has told me different. When we started planting our garden, most decisions were made up to my husband. He is the green thumb of course. This year was different – I knew Spring was meant to be the biggest opportunity and best growing season. I decided I was going to have something of my own. I looked into plants that were somewhat easy to grow (cause you know I have a brown thumb) and would be incredibly rewarding!
Sunflowers are not only beautiful, but you can easily harvest their seeds for a snack, feed the birds, or keep the seeds for the following years planting. When I went to get my sunflower seeds I came across the coolest sunflower I ever did see – Mammoth Sunflowers! They are exactly what you are imagining – the largest sunflowers that grow to enormous heights! They can get as large as 12 feet and sometimes their flowering heads are bigger than your own head! Ok. Sold. I am getting those ones.
(P.S. – they didn’t disappoint!!)
Location, Location, Location
Picking a location took me longer than the average bear. I needed full sun – but also couldn’t let these enormous sunflowers block sun from any part of the garden or I could ruin those plants. I found a new line that I could till up- that would allow for our garden to grow bigger, and also ensure that the sunflowers didn’t block anything. For this particular type of sunflower, it is suggested to plant them in a mound, and water them often.
If you plant the suggested 2-3 seeds per hole, be sure that as they start to grow you pick out the smaller plants to ensure you only have one plant per hole. I felt bad for my little sunflowers and couldn’t bring myself to weed any out. I allowed them to just grow 2 in a hole and the results of those sunflowers were very obvious that their growth was stunted. They were small and didn’t even grow taller than my waist. The ones I weeded were well above 8 feet tall. So don’t be a wuss – its survival of the fittest around here!
Watching them grow
Sunflowers grow fast – it is super rewarding and quick for those of us who are impatient to see their seeds start sprouting. I felt like each day that I checked on them I was in shock of the daily differences! It was always fun to measure yourself up to them, the kids loved it as well.
Make sure you are looking close too! It is awesome to watch the seeds form!
Time to harvest
When I started seeing the seeds popping up in the heads of my sunflowers I started researching when the right time was to remove the heads. It was surprisingly hard to get a straight answer on when to harvest. Ultimately I am seeing it is just preference. You want to ensure that the sunflower is done growing and you give it time to dry out. You can tell they are dying when the beautiful petals fall off and the back of the sunflower head starts to lose color / brown, and ultimately the back of the head will start to cave in as well. The longer you wait to remove the head, the greater risk of sweet birds or squirrels in your area that may find your treasure and start chowing down. If this happens to you- no worries, just remove it at that point!
To remove the heads just take a sharp knife and give yourself about a foot of stem to use as a handle. You then need to allow the heads to finish drying out- hang them in an airy spot, and they will continue to brown for a couple of days.
Now comes the messy part- removing the seeds. I totally underestimated how messy this was and decided to do it on my dining room table- uhh.. I will definitely be outside next time. You simply need to remove the blossoms on the ends of the seeds, and then get those seeds out. Either picking them one by one, or rub the ends in a circular motion and you will find they come lose in groups.
The messy part here is not only do you get seeds falling out- you get all the additional nature/flower/dirt that comes with it. But it’s all good. I have complete confidence in your ability to get passed this step!
EAT THEM!
I fully suggest saving some seeds for your next round of Sunflower growing – but for the rest, make yourself a nice little snack! I am going to be trying many new recipes in the future, but for the first round I kept it simple and followed this recipe from The Kitchen Garten. I would consider them as lightly salted, so my next batch I am going to double the salt. After that – it’s time to get creative with seasonings. The possibilities are endless!
Feel free to share your favorite sunflower seed recipe in the comments below!
