Re: [gardeners] Re: Sunflowers
olin (gardeners@globalgarden.com)
Mon, 24 Jun 2002 11:33:05 -0700
I wonder if the whole thing about sunflowers turning isn't a "suburban
legend". Our sunflowers are grown out in the full sun and they follow the
brightest light somewhat while still in the bud stage but after they are in
full bloom, the heads remain pretty stationary.
When your sunflowers follow the sun, do they return along the same arc at
night? Or do they flip back at sunrise to face the rising sun? Or do they
keep on going around to complete the orbit? Why didn't the plant that
turned 360 degrees twist its head off?
A few years back, we parked our RV next to a field of sunflowers in bloom in
Kansas for 24 hours and those did not follow the sun either.
Olin
----- Original Message ----- From: "George Shirley" <gshirl@bellsouth.net>
>...
> My youngest did a science fair experiment in junior high that involved
potted sunflowers and sun
> lamps. He finally had one plant that turned 360 degrees.
>
> When we had the two acres of them it was neat to watch them follow the sun
across the sky. The field
> was oriented east/west and the sunflowers started facing the SE right
after dawn and slowly worked
> their way to the SW by sunset.