You do not have to grow giant sunflowers to get a nice floral display. These smaller lemon coloured sunflowers with dark centres are called ‘Valentine’ and grow to about 4 feet tall and you can get a good look at the flowers without craning your neck to see. The blooms are still 6″ across and make good cut flowers. The plants branch from the ground making a compact display.

Smaller dwarf Sunflowers are available like the variety Teddy Bear at 16″ with flowers that are at least one third that size which look almost too big for the plant. Small branching Sunflowers like Chocolat and Musicbox come in mahogany and yellow shades are  2 feet high but my favourite dwarf would be Little Dorrit with 8 inch flowers on a 16 inch high plant.

Smaller dwarf Sunflowers do not need any special treatment. Biggest isn’t always best why not think about quantity and quality of blooms from these smaller Sunflowers.

I just purchased a selection of 6 varieties of Sunflower seed from Johnson seeds. Helianthus debilis like Italian White and a mulit branching mixture have small gritty seeds and will grow to about 5 foot. The dwarf variety included in the packet are called Teddy Bear and flower at 16″ high. Red Sun Helianthus annuus will grow to a larger 6-10 feet. Sadly this crop did not produce the goods and I left sunflowers alone for a while.