Definitely not the prettiest little sunflower in the whole world.
Wednesday has rolled around again, and with it another Serendipity Frisbee Photo Prompt… hosted as always by Marilyn. This week, we’ll look at my green black thumb when it comes to the thrilling hobby of gardening!
2010 was the first full year I spent in my new home, and I decided that year I actually wanted to try and grow something around the place besides mold. All of my prior “gardening” experience consisted of throwing the seeds from all those gourds we’d get every Halloween into the yard each Spring and watching the unwieldy vines take over everything, much to the delight of my parents. Gourd plants are even easier to take care of than cats, in that they won’t cry if you don’t feed and water them… they’ll do just fine on their own, thank you very much.
The vines will fight each other for what they can forage, though.
As a tribute to a certain character in my gang who meant the world to me sports a sunflower tattoo, I decided to buy a packet of the showy flower’s seeds that Spring, thinking it would be cool to have a bunch of them sprouted up in the flower beds that run across the front of my house. With careful watering and even a bit of Miracle Gro, about 6 or 7 little sunflower seedlings soon appeared out of the good earth! I was so excited…..
Until those 6 or 7 seedlings quickly dwindled down to just three….
Which soon became only two….
And finally, there was but one sole survivor that stuck around long enough to actually blossom….
It just looks really sad, doesn’t it?
The only stalk that got its moment in the sun happened to pop up right in front of my kitchen window, where the back of its sad little face could mope at me as I sat at the kitchen table eating supper over my laptop. I have seriously never seen a flower more in need of a hug than this pathetic plant did. It had a puny sunflower head that would get it laughed all the way out of Kansas… made to look even tinier in comparison to the gigantic, fanning leaves that became an all you can eat buffet for the local insects. As if its physical appearance was enough to shoot its self esteem all to hell, I don’t think it helped that it probably had a bad case of survivor’s guilt as well… or maybe was just envious that it didn’t get to die in dignity like its brothers and sister did…
I guess I better go fetch my Roundup…
You wouldn’t do that to this cute little face, would you?
I did try the sunflower experiment again the following year, only to have all of the seedlings uprooted by a wicked May storm that also relentlessly pelted their little bodies with hail. Given what happened before, it was probably a mercy killing. I haven’t planted another seed since…
Sad as it was, I still think fondly of my sorryass sunflower from five years ago… the only gardening success I’ve ever had at Nest HQ, and maybe the only thing close to curb appeal my home has ever had save for all of the adorable squirrels frolicking around…
Squirrels and sunflowers just go together.
Evil Squirrel's Nest 
at least you got one… and I bet it was as magic as Jack’s beanstalk :o) I have to admit that sunflowers are a little scary, I probably read too much of Mr. Kings novels as I was a teen :o)
I am glad it wasn’t a magic sunflower stalk! After reading your blog, I won’t be doing any climbing for a long time…
Awww, LB, it brings back memories. I know it’s easy for me to say, but you’re better off, I promise. Miss you!
You should comment more often then! I’m sure many of my Mecca songs would have appealed to your modern music tastes…
Just as well, you saw the one that got beheaded by a squirine gang over on Trish’s blog, right?
Yes I did. But apparently this one was too trashy even for the squirrels…
I like sunflowers so much, but can never grow them around here. Something about the clay soil and sneaky birds who eat the seeds before they sprout, mean no sunflowers for me. *sigh*
I’d say maybe the same around here, but I see yards with the gigantic sunflowers that would eat an intruder if they sprung to life. So they can thrive here, just not around my toxic horticultural wasteland…
Our flowers on the deck this year did pretty good but the veggies not so much. Some years it’s good and some it’s bad. At least your one flower was pretty.
I actually have tulips in that bed further down towards my front door that bloom every March, but they’re a relic from the previous owner so I don’t particularly take care of them. They just show up uninvited every Spring to get snowed on when we get that late season wintry blast…
Most of the flowers in our yard are perennials so they come back on their own. The only annuals we have tend to be in the boxes and baskets on the deck.
I’ve never had any luck with sunflowers. They really thrive in some places and just … splat … in others. I think here, we don’t have good soil AND we don’t have enough sun. I always look for them as I drive around because I love the bold look of them, but they don’t want to grow in MY yard.
Well, how inconsiderate of them to not like your soil and sunlight! I think it may be a conspiracy by the bobcats… first they take away the squirrels, and then the sunflowers. What next, your snow shovel?
Hey, at least the scrawny stem could support the flower! That’s better than most of the things I try to grow. My gardening specialty seems to be cultivating undersized, weak stems that tip over under the weight of a single bud.
I’m surprised your squirrels left that sunflower alone! I’ve only been able to grow a sunflower to maturity once here and it was half-grown when I bought it. Trying to grow sunflowers around squirrels is like trying to grow catnip around cats!
They must have been afraid of it. Or perhaps, since it was near the window, my always lurking cats scared them off. My deep freeze sits right under that window, and they like to lay on top of it to look out over their domain… and I guess to protect the scrawny sunflower.
I tried for years the squirrels always get the seeds.
Our squirrels and the birds are always faster. I think they watch me when I spread the seeds out.
They sit in the trees with binoculars, just waiting for someone foolish enough to plant food…. er, seeds in the yard!
Well. what can I say other than here I am, meet the fool 🙂
nasturtiums would positively ADORE and have wild plant orgies in that particular soil.
Fair dinkum, no bulldust, I kid you not! I mean it. 😀
1. the squirrels would look so cute gambolling among them.
2. if you use your imagination they are like tiny sunflowers.
3. the best “care” is to leaf them alone.
nasturtiums are picky and don’t like just any soil but they would thrive there.
I have never even heard of them! I’ll have to check those out, if I ever decide to do any yardwork again!
The only work you will have to do is cutting them back twice a year so they don’t take over. They are ideally suited to your soil and area and also adore being left in peace.
It sucked all the life-giving nutrients from its mates to emerge victorious! Awesome.
LOL, now that’s a Dralitwist! I’d hate to think of what the other sunflowers would have looked like if they had to share what poor nutrition that pathetic alpha plant managed to scrounge up out of my toxic soil!
One sunflower at least gave you something to post about!
Yes it did… thought it never lived to see its image in lights!