Sunflowers in the Garden

 One of my favorite summertime annuals is the sunflower. Sunflowers come in a wide variety of sizes and colors. They begin blooming in late summer and provide lots of color at a time when lots of other blooms begin to fade. However, the main reason I enjoy growing them in my own garden is for their wildlife value.

Sunflowers are great companion plants planted near a vegetable garden. They attract lots of pollinators as well as other beneficial insects that help contribute to the overall health of the garden. They also attract lots of butterflies and would make a great selection for the butterfly garden as well. As sunflowers mature, birds, especially finches, love to feed on their protein-rich seeds. It’s an all-around great summer annual for the attracting wildlife to the garden.

Many varieties nowadays come in various colors and have more than one bloom on the stalk, like these ‘Sunny Babe’ Sunflowers.

A new sunflower I added to my own garden this year is Tithonia, aka Mexican Sunflower (Tithonia rotundiflora). While it is related, it’s not a sunflower in the conventionally known sense. It’s slightly shorter in height and has larger, bushier leaves coming out of its stem. The center part of the flower is yellow as opposed to the regular sunflower's brownish color. Many compare the flower to the looks of a dahlia, but the color ranges in different varieties are only found in the red-yellow-orange portion of the spectrum. It’s native to Mexico and Central America.

This flower is an excellent attractant for butterflies, hummingbirds and lots of other pollinators.

These guys grow to a height of 5 to 7  feet! I’ll definitely be saving seeds from these for next year.

This was a volunteer sunflower that came up near my birdfeeder filled with sunflower seeds. Notice the large shaped disk.

This sunflower was definitely bred for seed production. This variety (unknown) would make an excellent choice for attracting birds to the backyard. I’ll try to save some of these seeds for next year if the birds don’t beat me to it first.

Sunflowers are an all-time garden favorite that provide that feel-good cheery aspect to the garden. They are remarkably tough and easy to grow. Give them a try in your own garden.

Mistletoe: Not Just for Kissing

 Tis the season for mistletoe! Most would agree that the Christmas season and mistletoe go hand in hand. I remember my dad shooting it out of the trees when I was a youngster.  According to folklore, after every kiss under the mistletoe one of the berries was plucked, and once all the berries where gone, there was no more kissing.

American mistletoe can be found all throughout eastern and southern forest of the US, and is especially fond of maple trees. It’s unveiled each year when the last of the leaves fall from the trees and reveal their clumps of green, ball-shaped foliage growing among the tree branches.

There’s more to mistletoe than just holiday tradition. Believe it or not, it plays an important part in our ecosystem. Mistletoe is a host plant for the great purple hairstreak butterfly, and is the only plant that its larva will eat.

Mistletoe is also a good winter food source for birds. Birds feast on the female mistletoe’s white berries, which are toxic to humans, and then spread the sticky seeds to other trees through their droppings. From there it takes root into the tree. It’s considered a hemiparasite because it doesn’t live entirely off the tree. Mistletoe generates its own photosynthesis; however, it does depend on the tree for its food and water, enough so that the tree could die from a heavy infestation – but in most cases, that’s not the case.

For the most part, this unique native is harmless and its benefits to wildlife and our holiday enjoyment outweigh its potential invasiveness.

I want to personally wish everyone a happy and safe holiday!!

MonarchLIVE Distance Learning

I wanted to make this aware to those who have or educate children that beginning this month (October), children from the United States, Mexico, and Canada will tune in to watch the kickoff of MonarchLIVE.

MonarchLIVE is an exciting conservation education project that uses satellite broadcast and Web technology to bring the magic of monarch butterfly migration to classrooms and children throughout the Western Hemisphere. The project is available for free to classrooms. While the main audience targets grades 4 thru 8, the project provides a wide range of extensions that will support both younger and older students. It is estimated that more than 400,000 thousand children across the country will participate throughout the 2008-09 school year.

For more details about MonarchLIVE, visit www.fs.fed.us/monarch to watch a 2-minute video or visit the project Web site at monarch.pwnet.org.