MASTER GARDENER: Sunflowers are the queen of all annual flowers

Popular Flower Types

Flowers are the ultimate gift to show your loved ones how much you care. Whether it’s to say congratulations or thanks, these ten blossoms are ideal.

Plant lily seeds in spring for blooms that last all summer until frost. Ferns are a staple in the shade garden, while phlox blooms from early spring until fall.

Lobelia is definitely one of my favorite flowers but there is nothing to write about it other than it is pretty, humble and fills in spaces around more showy flowers — so instead I will write about sunflowers.

My favorite seed catalog has six pages of sunflowers and doesn’t even sell lobelia.

I will profess that sunflowers are the queen of all annual flowers. They range in color from dark burgundy to nearly white. Some produce only one flower and some produce a multitude of flowers over a period of more than a month. They are known to be very tall (up to 12 to 15 feet) but I grew an 18 inches, single-flowered variety in a Master Gardener seed trial last year.

Sunflower seeds are a popular snack food but popularity is lost among school bus drivers. A mammoth gray stripe variety comes to mind. Most make better bird seed where smaller seeds are valued.

Sunflowers are excellent cut flowers. They will last for more than a week if they are picked early in the bloom cycle. Florists prefer hybrid varieties that don’t produce allergenic pollen which can shed on other flowers in the arrangement and on your tablecloth.

By themselves, they don’t produce seeds but they will if they receive pollen from other sunflowers. The seeds will produce hybrid sunflowers but not the same hybrids that you planted.

A pollenless variety called Buttercream took first place in a special category at last year’s Beltrami County Fair and I used the premium money to buy more seeds.

Sunflowers are great for bees and other pollinators. Bees require both pollen and nectar from flowers.

The pollenless flowers are missing pollen so I make sure I plant regular varieties too.

Unfortunately, deer also love sunflowers so I replant some of the volunteer sunflowers. I move them to the corners and edges of the garden and then I spray them with an organic deer repellant. I haven’t had a deer problem in my garden in recent years.

Sunflowers are susceptible to frost so plant them with your tomatoes, peppers, beans, and squash.

They can also be started indoors about three to four weeks before transplanting outdoors.

Last year I had great success with Mexican sunflowers which produced a 4-5 foot hedge with abundant orange flowers that the pollinators and some hummingbirds enjoyed. Some year soon I will try the perennial Maximillian sunflower.

These local garden articles will reach you each week throughout the gardening season, but gardening information can be found year-round by clicking on “Yard and Garden” at the University of Minnesota Extension website, www.extension.umn.edu, or by visiting our Facebook page at www.facebook.com/Beltramicountymastergardeners.

If you have any questions, feel free to reach out the Beltrami County Master Gardener hotline at (218)-444-7916 and leave a message with your name, phone number, and a short description of your question or problem. Your call will be returned within two days.

Source: bemidjipioneer.com