As a man who read comic books as a teenager, I'm pretty attuned to mutants and how they got their superpowers. Can anyone tell me how this sunflower got its superpowers?
It's a volunteer that was transplanted, no less, something I heard that sunflowers don't typically tolerate. It nearly died, but since then has grown to about 13-14' with a stem (perhaps trunk is a better word) so thick you could use it for a baseball bat or fence post. It's a dehybridized Mammoth, I think, which explains the size and the fact that it's just a big green plant with tiny flowering heads that have yet to open.
I didn't even fertilize this bed that I can recall, so who know what its root found down in the soil. It has been a great growing season, with copious rain and lots of sun, so perhaps it's just all natural goodness. Kansas is the sunflower state, after all; surely there's a reason for that.
8.06.2008
They don't call them Mammoth for nothing
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2 comments:
I've found that sunflowers transplant extremely well if they are small, like about 6 inches tall or so. Once they get above roughly 1 foot tall, you are toast.
That's an impressive specimen. Can you enter it in the county fair? :)
Alas, the fair is past, but that would have been the ticket if there were a category for big, mangy sunflowers! Actually, in Kansas, that would be a crowded category.
Believe it or not, I didn't get around to transplanting this plant until it was nearly two feet tall, and it still survived. "That which doesn't kill me only makes me stronger," I guess.
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