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West Amwell, NJ

First the negatives:
I've had quite a few disasters this year. Many of my sunflowers were hit with sunflower downy mildew. A few by stem borers. I'm not seeing anything that is really stand out this year with the sunflowers. Starlings pulled out most of my corn; so I had to replant and didn't get the early start I wanted. I didn't arrage the garden well this year. I put a few rows of corn, few rows of sunflower, corn, sunflowers, etc. This backfired big time because the sunflowers blew away the corn and ended up shading it out. Much of the pearl millet, sorghum, teosinte, and okra hasn't been very hardy and it's been tough going to this point. My Amaranthus cannabinus has been hit extremely hard by insect, but now I'm spraying (generally against my belief) and it's making a comeback.

7/13/2007 3:26:07 PM

Dillsburg, PA

I'm very happy with the seeds you gave me (Botts). Some of them are over 9ft with no signs of flowering. For my first year with these things I'm very pleased. The spot they are placed in was only completed in April. I have fertilized a lot though.

7/13/2007 3:33:19 PM

West Amwell, NJ

the positives:
I trialed many new varieties of giant corn, and I may have found a winner. Olotillo Blanco seems to be as aggressive as Jala. I've been very impressed to this point with it's growth. In my garden in NJ, it's currently the tallest. My garden in NY, Jala is slightly taller than the Olotillo Blanco. Jury is still out on it though until it reaches full height. I haven't been has happy with Oloton, which has had a lot of lodging problems. The lima beans look to be real winners. If I can collect enough seeds, they are going into the veggie exchange next year. The giant amaranth (amaranthus australis) is doing the best this year. I'm hoping they can hang on and we avoid any major storms. I'm getting close to the world record. I just hope they don't flower anytime soon. My friend in Poughkeepsie and I are close in height; so it's hard to say who is going to break the record.

7/13/2007 3:37:39 PM

Georgia

Man my sunflowers are doing great. Im gonna post in my diary soon as there heads open up some more. I measured one of them at 15 feet and the rest are just as close. I staked them with 8 feet stakes beacause thats the biggest stakes I could find and they seem to be holding up well. I have one shorter sunflower at about 8 feet but right now its got 22 heads on it. Ill try to post pics next week in my diary.

7/13/2007 3:39:16 PM

West Amwell, NJ

Bott's are one of my favorites. I generally do much better with them than Cravens. I've found Bott's are 80-90 days flowers, where Cravens are 100+. It gives the stem borers much more time to cause damage with the Cravens.

I'm trying some chinese seeds from the USDA, and some chinese seeds I received from a sunflower researcher, Tom Heaton. They seem to be doing very well. I have a variety from Germany that is currently my tallest. If I can collect enough seeds, I'll get them into the veggie exchange.

7/13/2007 3:42:34 PM

Georgia

sunflower_info I rarely ever spray my sunflowers with insect spray what do you reccomend to keep borers off of them . Its bad enough Svbs are attacking my pumpkin plants?

7/13/2007 3:44:27 PM

West Amwell, NJ

I'm not quite sure what to spray the sunflowers with, because I'm not entirely positive what type of insect the borers are. I contacted someone from the Hunterdon County Master Gardeners and they said I could send them a sample of a borer, and they would send it off to Rutgers to determine the species. I'm not sure where to spray, because I'm not sure if they are getting in from the ground, leaves, etc.

7/13/2007 3:49:54 PM

West Amwell, NJ

One thing to mention to anyone growing Bott's Strain of Richard Hope sunflowers I sent out in the past few years. If you a sunflower that has yellow on the leaves (around the veins of the leaf) and white powder on the underside of the leaf then IMMEDIATELY dispose of the sunflower and get it as far away from the garden as possible. Be careful not to disturb the white powder on the underside of the leaves as they are spores. This is called sunflower downy mildew and it's a very dangerous disease which is specific to sunflowers. I just sent some plants off to the head of the USDA sunflower research department to verify the race of milew (there are multiple races). I have a mild variety. I've been able to recover infected plants with Potassium bicarbonate. It can be transferred to other gardens through seeds, wind, etc. It can survive in the soil for 5 to 10 years (even with no sunflower plantings)

7/13/2007 3:55:33 PM

Georgia

I have yellow on my leaves but I never found any white powder. It just looks like its a sign of age because none of the newer top leaves get it until they age quite a bit. Ive seen a lot of sunflowers on the web with the same thing.

7/13/2007 4:09:49 PM

Dillsburg, PA

What and how often do you guys fertilize. I used blood meal most of the year with some 20/20/20. Not sure if fish is enough???

7/13/2007 4:57:14 PM

West Amwell, NJ

When I turn the garden over the spring, I buy several 50 pound bags of Espoma Garden Tone
http://www.espoma.com/content.aspx?type=p&id=27&intCategoryID=4

and some 20 pound bags of Espoma Dried Manure
http://www.espoma.com/content.aspx?type=p&id=15&intCategoryID=2

Espoma also makes a Plant Tone, which is more nitrogen than Garden Tone that you can use instead of mixing the manure with the Garden Tone.
http://www.espoma.com/content.aspx?type=p&id=24&intCategoryID=4

and till it into the garden. I just let everything grow, and I don't do anything until the end of June. Then I start doing daily or every other day with those new miracle grow canisters that attach to the hose. This year I'm also trying that Super-Thrive (vitamin B1 and plant hormones) on some of the plants to see if it makes a difference in growth.

7/13/2007 5:24:42 PM

Netherlands

We have had a very cold and wet year till now. Excessive rain fall at the end of June and beginning of July has really slowed down growth. My marrow has really slowed down as the ground became waterlogged. It was off to an excellent start. Will definately grow in a drier spot next year.

Tallest sunflower is Craven (about 8-9 feet), with Bott and Hope doing about 7-8 feet. Hotter weather expected.

Jala corn not doing very good at all. Also waiting for better weather.

I'll check for mildew.

7/14/2007 6:51:20 AM

Dillsburg, PA

One of my Botts sunflowers seems to have split in three at around 6-7 foot. Its around 9 now. I wonder if it will have three heads?

7/16/2007 1:19:31 PM

Georgia

Jeff most likely you will I had two plants do that for some reason and they both have three heads and more to come probally. One of my sunflowers which isnt that tall maybe 8 feet actually has over 20 heads.I thought that was a nice surprise.

7/16/2007 1:23:46 PM

Dillsburg, PA

I wonder if we plant the seeds of those multi sunflowers will they tend to do this more?

7/16/2007 2:12:55 PM

Georgia

Good question but im not really sure. Im no expert I just got lucky this year and grew some real tall ones and some multi headed ones. You should start to see them flowering up in the next couple of feet.

7/16/2007 2:28:30 PM

West Amwell, NJ

When I originally obtained the bott's strain seeds, it said on the site that it was sometimes multi-headed. I usually remove any plants that are multi-headed.

I don't always do control pollination; and I do sometimes grow multi-headed plants in the same area. You may have a cross between a multi-headed of mine with a Bott's Strain. It all depends on what the resultant seeds look like. If the seeds are very small, then it crossed with either a Hemker or a Nebraska (USDA) plant. I have a Nebraska plant this year that self-sowed and seems to have crossed with a single headed giant, as it has much larger leaves than last year's Nebraska plants. I can tell it's a Nebraska from the unusual bending in the stem that I saw in last year's plants. If it crossed with one of my multi-headed, it should effect height much, as Hemkers and Nebraska plants can exceed 15 ft. tall.

7/16/2007 4:26:07 PM

West Amwell, NJ

Dutch Brad,

Tropical corn doesn't do well in cold weather. It really doesn't blast off until it warms up. Jala is one of the best I've seen in cooler weather. So far, Olotillo Blanco seems to be performing well too. Ones that don't do well in cooler weather are Cuzco Gigante and Oloton. Montana does so-so. You might have to look into other types if you can't do well with Jala. I would recommend Goliath Silage corn. I doubt you'll get 20+ ft. with that, but you can get 15-16 ft. plants. I've heard of it growing to almost 19 ft.

7/16/2007 4:29:40 PM