My sunflowers! ?

That’s great!

DH and I were just saying, while admiring ours, ‘isn’t it funny how they start off so small and you worry. Now they’re so sturdy and strong’.
It is comical to look at the 3ft sticks we once put in the ground to support them.

Wow phoenix!

I tried them from seed for the first time this year too. Mine are not as tall as yours but they have been grown in pots. Here is the first one to flower.
So bright and cheerful.

That’s a beauty phoenix.

We had a couple sprout up in our garden and they grew to about 3.5 - 4 feet tall.
We didn’t plant them, sunflower seeds from the nearby bird feeder must have landed in the border and germinated.
They were a lovely surprise. ??

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I have only one that’s grown tall it’s 8+ feet I’ve taken a pic it’s not very clear because the flower is in the shade the other one it’s little brother, I found an old packet in my shed and just bunged them in never thinking they would grow.. I love all your happy pics.

Slugs got most of my sunflower seedlings.

I love sunflowers and yours look great specimens phoenix & ginny. I have tried to grow the tall ones but they always seem to get eaten up by the slugs & snails. I grew dwarf varieties in pots a couple of years ago and they were far more successful.

Wow - you're all growing some marvellous sunflowers. Mine are only about 5 feet tall, but so cheerful, I can forgive them for not growing like Jack's beanstalk

The bees love them too

Well done Phoenix, youve done well with those! If you watch them, they turn their faces to follow the sun and the bees just love them. I sowed a row of 10 along the boundary fence at the bottom of my garden and only 8 have survived; 2 having succumbed to slugs. They're all about to open flower very shortly but one is very much taller than the others and is still forming it's flower head. Soon as it flowers, I'll post a picture!

Ps.... save your flower seeds, once it's died back. Free seeds for next year.

Mine are about 6'6" to 7' this year and I'm pleased with them for once. The bees love them too.
They are in a container but the ones planted in the garden beds haven't appeared at all.

Beautiful display of sunflowers there ladies!

Did you see this sunflower maze on BBC news this morning? A large field of 6ft high sunflowers with Nhs logo cut through them. The farmer did it as a thank you tribute to staff who treated him. It takes an average of 45 mins to find your way through the maze. Admission charges going to Nhs. It looks stunning.
www.sunflowermaze.co.uk/

I hope you do win, phoenix.
They look very healthy plants.

Do you feed them with any fertiliser?

Our street has a sunflower competition started after the last clap for key workers. Seeds from over the road neighbours wee girl which she planted and gave each neighbour 2 small plants. One of ours is growing well, other not so but our direct neighbour's 5yo plant flowered today in the pouring rain admired by DGS2 when we got home sodden after jumping in puddles for an hour. Rain bouncing off the road but it was a ray of sunshine in the storm.

I love all your sunflowers! Gdcs have been growing them, too - one has succumbed to something, probably slugs, but the others are huge. Birds will be pleased with the seeds.

We were recently in France, Burgundy area, where there are lots of fields full of sunflowers, but some whole fields full were dying because of the drought. Very sad.

Fingers crossed for you Phoenix

Hello all,

Calllistemon I did give them a dose of Miracle Grow once a week.

Measured on Sunday, tallest currently 8ft 6" , but someone else has one nearly 10ft

A lot of "mutant" ones with multiple heads.

Looking good Phoenix; the multi headed ones are double value for money! As one head dies back, you can cut it off to allow the other one room. Keep the severed head for its seeds.

They look a lot better than mine, although the bees did like them.

There should have been more, but Mr Blackbird kept tweaking them out of the soil when they were small.

If you let them ‘die off’, they self seed for next year and the birds enjoy them too. In France, they let them ‘die off’/fully ripen, then they’re harvested.

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Monster Sunflower has finally shown her face! Her little sister is the height of my next door neighbour's conservatory gutters but Monster towers above her as you can see. I'm reckoning about 12 feet? The others are abou 8 - 9 feet tall.

Well, I didn't win prize for the tallest, but did get the one for most heads I'm not a mutant, honestly!

??????

Well done.
The best polysunflowers!

Well, now it's my poor sunflowers we had strong wind over yesterday and last night, (not Mr P and I personally , you understand, just weatherwise) and they have broken! Even the supporting canes snapped .

So, I have cut off the flowers the could be salvaged and out them in a vase.

The other stems and heads have been put in the ditch at the bottom of the garden, rather hoping that they will self seed, would be lovely to have them coming up between the old hedge of hawthorn, holly, willow etc!