Monday, August 25, 2008

A Review: Mexican Sunflower


Pretty flowers right? That is what I though when I bought seed for this Mexican Sunflower. With promises of butterflies and blossoms what could go wrong?
Well the foliage is dang ugly! Not only that but it took forever for this plant to bloom. Part of it is my fault, I got the seeds in late to the ground and I misread the final height of the plant. Here is the plant in all its glory!

The description from the company I got it from reads:

Boasting the deepest, most intensely-colored blooms of any Mexican Sunflower we know, Goldfinger is a two-tone delight in the sunny summer garden! The deep, persimmon-orange petals and bright yellow central buttons almost glow with warm color on floriferous, long-blooming 4-foot plants, putting on a long show of unforgettably rich color!

One of the pure joys of the sunny summer garden, Goldfinger needs almost no attention once it begins its massive months-long bloom! The densely-branched plants sport so many big 3 1/2-inch daisies that they attract every butterfly for miles to your garden! And the hotter it gets, the better Goldfinger likes it! Every garden deserves a trouble-free, floriferous joy like this hard-working annual!
Notice how much more red their flowers are, not to mention how many more flowers they show in their picture. Also notice how they do not show any foliage, because it is UGLY. I have seen butterflies on it so at least that part it true. I have to say they definitely got me on this one.

Here is my final review:

Flowers: Nice, not as big as they claim, mine are 1.5-2 inches. They are more orange than pictured. Good for attracting butterflies and bees.

Foliage: Ugly! Leaves are big and unappealing. Leaves are droopy at night.

Fragrance: None that I noticed.

Growing Notes: Needs more sun than where it is now. Plant earlier, since take awhile to flower.

Would I grow this one again: Maybe, if I can find another plant of the right height to put in front of it to cover up all its foliage.
LadyBug gives Mexican Sunflower
ThornyGuy gives Mexican Sunflower

3 comments:

Chris said...

The description says it likes it hot, so maybe our cold spring and cool summer effected it too.

Either way, Thorny Guy gives these Mexican Sunflowers 2 shovels down.

Kylee Baumle said...

You know, I still think it's pretty and what I've found is that sometimes one plant will do well one summer and the next it doesn't (and the other way around).

I'm always confused as to what to do with plants that like sun, yet they end up wilting by the end of the day, BECAUSE OF THE SUN. Crazy!!

CiNdEe's GaRdEn said...

The flowers are pretty though. I thought all summer that grasshoppers were eating my sunflowers(the regular ones) well one day I was looking at them and there was a gold finch just chopping away at the leaves. It ate all the leaves on one of my plants in just a short time!!!!! So....the grasshoppers are off the hook!!!(-: I also feed the gold finches so I have no idea why they were eating my sunflower leaves...

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