Sunflowers

[ysb33r]

I guess many people tend to take sunflowers fro granted or simply as something for the kids to grow. Does anyone here actually grow sunflowers for harvesting the seeds for culinary use i.e eating as a snack, using in breads/rolls etc.

May sound a bit stupid, but how many flowers do you actually grow to get a decent harvest of seeds? And do they fit into any vegetable group? AFAIK they are related to artichokes in some way.

[Two_Sheds]

Jerusalem artichokes are related to sunflowers.
I tried cropping sunflower heads (for my parrots). Got loads of seeds, but it takes hours and hours, no DAYS and DAYS to get all the seeds out by hand, tears up your fingernails too. I did get a carrier bag full...worth about 38p in the petshop!

[rustylady]

I grow sunflowers for the beauty of them, and leave the seed heads for the wild birds to help themselves. If you want to grow for the kitchen you need lots of plants, lots of time and lots of patience. You need to let the flower heads ripen, strip the seeds (that hurts your fingers), let them dry and then store them.

[yoanbob]

the chickens remove their own seeds, takes them hours, they love it.

[SarzWix]

I think it's possible to buy seeds for sunflowers which are bred for seed production - these give more & larger seeds than ones bred for the garden. It's also possible to press the seeds for oil. However, I don't think it's worth doing on a small scale, except as an experiment maybe. As mentioned above, birds and chickens love them tho, and can pick out the seeds from the heads themselves, all you have to do is hang them up.