Sun Flower

In France they call the sunflower 'giresol' meaning (roughly) 'rotates with the sun'. Sunflowers are members of the Daisy family and that flower - the daisy - got its name because it opens in the daytime and closes its petals at night, so it is the 'Day's Eye'. Flowers and plants are intriquing things. The ones which I find most people (especially children) are fascinated by are the ones which react very quickly to touch. We don't normally think of plants as being able to feel things but, even though they don't have a nervous system like ours, there are plants which snap their leaves shut when a fly lands on them (the Venus flytrap) and plants which squeeze out pollen when a bee - or anything else, such as a human with a matchstick - pokes its head into the flower (St John's Wort or Hypericum).

i am anxiously awaiting our sunflowers to open up, so far, they have grown quite high and i am not sure, but there are a few buds on there. ours generally open towards the end of August.

Makes sense to me. Of course according to my aunt years ago i have a brown thumb instead of a green one so needless to say my flowers are few & far between, lol.My grandmother use to raise them in her garden. I think they are very pretty.

This is by far one of my favorite plants as it looks good and has a use(sunflower seeds). How many have you planted in your garden?

The ones I grow always seem to face the opposite direction of the house, like the ones in the back garden right now. I wanted them to face this way but always the same thing every year. I guess the sun is more brighter towards the side they face, you're right. Hence their name, appropriately called the Sunflower. I have one very very large one growing in the garden, the rest are somewhat smaller.

Hi, I haven't seen sunflower on the plant. I only seen it in the market. I heard about sunflower that it turns it head towards sun. You are lucky that you experienced it. In our neighborhood, they have a flower plant called Brahmakamal. It's a very beautiful flower. But it blooms at night at 12 and weather in the morning. I have seen this flower.It is quite opposite to sunflower. Really nature is very wonderful.

Hello suzzy. That's why the sun flower. It worships the sun. When I was a young girl I lived in Nebraska and we had lovely small sunflowers growing all along the dirt roads and some times n the fields.

My parents have a few sunflowers in their garden, and though they do follow the sun slightly, the interesting thing is that there are several varieties, there are two with giant heads the size of a large dinner plate, medium normal sized ones(basically desert plate size) and small ones. One of the small ones has 8 flowers on the same stalk, I had never seen that as normally one stalk one flower. The giant headed sunflowers have already lost their petals and are full of seeds, where as the small ones have just come into bloom. It is interesting to watch though. The reason there is so much variety has to do with the fact that they are seeds that fall from the cockatiel's feeding tray.

All plants follow the sun. That's why you need to turn your house plants every now and then or they tend to lean in one direction -- towards the window. I have a sunflower in my backyard, too. It was planted by either a bird or a squirrel (my neighbor puts out birdfeed in the winter). I had one last year, too, planted again by some critter, but when I went out to cut off the seed head, the squirrels got to it first. This one's not very tall, but it is in flower.

We have kept one plant at the place where we live now. However, it is not a flowering one. Yet, I love the flowers- especially when they bloom in springtime, and spread their colors and happiness around.

Oh Wow know I want one and see this for myself. How cool!