Planting sunflowers in open ground

Recently, summer residents have increasingly begun to plant sunflowers on their plots. Why did gardeners fall in love with this yellow “sun”? on a long leg? It turns out that this is a yellow “sun” easy to plant, it is quite unpretentious during the growth process. However, there are still some nuances in growing sunflowers. Nowadays you can buy sunflower seeds or order them online. The specialized company Limagren in the Russian Federation makes an excellent offer: a line of sunflower hybrids resistant to five races of broomrape. In any case, their choice is quite large. You can purchase plants that have large heads or several small ones on one stem. Sunflower seeds can vary in color, as well as whether they can be eaten by humans or are only suitable for birds. You need to take into account how tall the sunflower grows and choose an appropriate place for it on the site.

Landing place

Sunlit plots where there is no shadow from buildings or fruit trees are best suited for planting this plant. Usually the sunflower with its flower faces east, so this is also taken into account when planting the plant. Very often, due to the height of the plant, it is planted along the border of the garden plot. There should also be a wall next to the sunflowers that will protect them from gusts of wind. But this structure should not shade the sunflowers so that they have about 7 hours of sunlight. The soil must be loosened before planting. Sunflower is unpretentious to different soils; it grows poorly only on sandy soils. This happens because in such soil the plant cannot be held firmly by its roots. Before planting, it is worth adding compost fertilizer or rotted manure to the prepared beds so that the plants grow better. It is necessary to plant seeds in the ground when there is no chance of frost on the soil. When planting seeds, it is necessary to maintain a distance between them, taking into account the height and size of sunflowers:

• Huge plants are planted in beds, the distance between the seeds is about a meter, and between the beds —; 1 meter 20 cm.
• Medium ones are planted at a distance of 6/10 meters from each other, and the distance between the beds should be about a meter.
• Small sunflowers are planted every 30 cm, and the distance between planting rows is about a meter.
• The seeds are deepened into the soil no more than 10 cm.
• After planting the seeds, it is recommended to cover the rows with a special net to prevent birds from pecking them.

Some gardeners grow sunflowers through seedlings. Each seed is planted in a separate cup; when the weather settles, the seedlings (which already have 2-4 permanent leaves) are planted in prepared beds. The distance between seedlings must be maintained as indicated above.