Winter Crops and Sunflowers

When I started planting my winter vegetables this fall, I was looking forward to some radishes carrots, snow peas, spinach - the cool weather vegetables.

As the seeds started sprouting and slowly growing through the cooler weather and shorter days, I started noticing an unexpected crop.

I had previously planted some black oil seed sunflower (Helianthus annulus) in the same bed. Apparently, I missed some seeds when I harvested the sunflowers. So, alongside my vegetable crop, these sunflowers started growing. One of them has even bloomed. I was not aware that they grow this late in the year, much less bloom in late fall amidst the frosty weather and all the rains.

sunflower tina saravia 2022

Read more