Sunflowers

The picture at the top of my blog is currently of one of the Russian Giant sunflowers that I have been growing in our garden every year for the past 5 years. They can grow to be ridiculously huge. The first year I grew them, I had a couple of plants that were well over 12 ft/3m high with flowers over 12 inches wide. They were the gardening talk of the neighbourhood. When I was out walking the dog, people would stop me ask if I was from the house with the massive sunflowers. Truth be told, sunflowers are not hard to grow. They are like weeds. They will grow anywhere. The last few years I have been planting second generation seeds - seeds from the plants from the following year, and I have noticed that they have not been as big in years past. However, we have had a couple of extraordinarily dry summers in Aurora, so perhaps that's what has lead to the smaller sunflowers. Last year's group topped out at about 8 ft/2m.

I thought that with winter dragging on here in southern Ontario - it's past mid-March and we are expecting more snow today, that a picture of a beautiful sunflower in full and perfect bloom would brighten my day, and it has. I hope that it has done the same for any one else who stops by.