Our Homestead

For people with kids, if they want to learn how to garden, sunflowers are the most perfect things to start with.
Why, you ask?
Because they grow so incredibly fast. The kids don't have to wait several weeks to see some change.

There is really only one good way to transplant sunflowers.
1) They must be very young plants. Older plants are nearly impossible to transplant.
2) You must have *all* the roots, so scoop plenty of dirt with the plant.
Sunflowers don't transplant well at all, or at least this has been my experience. It's easier when you transplant them from a pot outdoors, but transplanting from one outdoor location to another by digging them up is very hard to do. Best is to plant them immediately in the spot where they will grow so that you don't need to transplant them.

I am a huge fan of giant sunflowers. I start them in springtime in my greenhouse. It's difficult to get them started because the chipmunks will literally pull he young seedlings out of the ground in order to get to the seeds. 
After planting, I put the seeds in large see-through containers. They can grow up to a foot in the containers, but then they reach the top. At that point, I plant them in the garden.

I dig a pretty deep hole of about a foot depth and a couple feet wide and fill it with manure. I plant the sunflowers so deep that the first set of leaves is only just above the ground.
I then totally over-water the hole and keep adding water after every few scoops of manure.
The sunflowers are now watered deep and won't have to be watered again, usually for the entire season.

Since they are planted so deep, the roots take hold nicely and the sunflowers can weather any storm without falling over.
Once they are done blooming, they serve as food for the chipmunks.