(Helianthus nuttallii)

Nuttall’s sunflower was unexpectedly one of our favorite cut flowers this year. Each plant kicked out an insane amount of blooms from mid-summer until early October, which made it easy to always have a mason jar with a few blooms. This was also a favorite of all our local song birds who would greet the plants every dawn in the late days of summer and feast on unripe seeds.

This perennial species prefers loamy or clay soils that are somewhat moist, and it will spread via rhizomes when happy to create a dense sunflower forest that can get up to 13’ tall! Like yerba mansa and swamp milkweed, this is a good plant to put near your rain spout, or in other zones that have higher than average water.

In our region, Nuttall’s sunflower is a great pollinator plant for 2nd and 3rd generation monarch populations that need nectar before heading south.

Cold stratify seeds for 4 weeks and then direct sow in early spring, or start indoors and then transplant after danger of frost to 2’ spacing.

Packet: 50 seeds