It turns out that you can be the worst at growing what is deemed “the easiest flower to grow.” In case you hadn’t heard sunflowers are supposedly indestructible. You just stick the seed in the ground, cover it up, give it some sun and water and like magic you have a giant flower a few months later.

Apparently, the ease of sunflower growing skips a person every now and then. I have had a real heck of a time with this guys this summer.

This summer I was captivated by a post of the most beautiful white sunflowers. I had never seen white sunflowers before and decided that I would be a white sunflower gardener. I google searched white sunflower seeds ordered some from the first website I could find and waited by my mailbox for them to arrive. As soon as they arrived I ran in the back yard and planted those bad boys. I didn’t read anything about sun needed, depth of planting, or spacing. I just poked my finger into the ground plopped a seed in, covered it up and sprayed it down with water.

I actually think this approach was not as flawed as I am letting on. I did get some germination but it took three weeks, which is not normal. While I waited for my pretties to sprout I dug in and did a lot of flower growing and farming research. I realized that I ordered a variety that is not idea for cut flowers. They were a branching variety that had pollen. While that is not bad for landscaping, it is not ideal for cut flowers that you bring into the house. I then ordered hundred of other white sunflowers called Procut White Night and Procut White Light. I planted them all over the yard. I had much better germination on these ones and will be bringing some in this week hopefully!

I maybe got a little too confident and went ham on the Sunflower Selections website. I ordered four different varieties of sunflowers and decided to plant up the back yard. I thought I would try starting my seeds in trays this time to see if I could get even better germination. I ordered 72 cell trays that came with humidity domes. I figured why not use them and leave the trays outside to get really hot and sultry. Did I mention I did this in August….. in Arizona?

I think you can tell where this is going. I essentially cooked the seeds to death. I had absolutely no germination. None, not a single sunflower wanted to give me a chance here! I tried to sow the seeds into the ground directly and I think maybe I have one that sprouted. One out of 400! I am a big fan of learning from your mistakes and finding things that don’t work but my success rate of 0.0025% still stings!

At this point my white sunflower sprouts were starting to get eaten by bugs that just discovered our yard. Apparently white sunflowers, or white flowers in general are more susceptible to bug damage. So i was killing seeds, not getting any to germinate, and the ones that were germinating were being eaten. I was pretty defeated.

Then I happened the one and only Lisa Mason Ziegler at the Gardner’s Workshop. She starts sunflower in cells and doesn’t fry them. I followed her steps to success and I was successful!

Step 1: Fill cell tray with a mix of equal parts potting soil and compost

Step 2: Add a seed per cell

Step 3: Add to heating mat

Step 4: Watch your seeds germinate

Step 5: Harden off in a couple weeks

Step 6: Transplant seedlings into the garden

This really worked! I tried it out and my little transplants are doing great. I have a much better germination rate than I did sowing directly in the soil. The plants are growing more quickly and seen happier. I would 10/10 recommend starting sunflowers indoors with cell trays. While sunflowers are relatively easy to grow you can still goof them up and this method is rather fool proof.

If you are a grower and have any tips for growing sunflowers drop them in the comments below!