Choosing Sunflower Varieties

I'm wanting to include sunflowers in my garden. I'm wanting both seeds and sunflower oil. Can someone suggest the highest yield in both category, both edible seeds and oil production? Of course I open pollinated seeds.

Thanks!

This spring will be my own adventure into sunflowers. My primary reason is the pollen for the bees. Next in line is feed for the livestock. Third, a source of sunflower oil.

So far I've noticed that there are numerous varieties being grown for the flower industry. While they might be pretty and not so tall, most are "pollen less". Soil going to have to be careful in choosing my varieties.

would you like your management practices to be intensive and high yield or less intensive good yield? more priority on oil or seeds?

Jordan Lowery wrote:would you like your management practices to be intensive and high yield or less intensive good yield? more priority on oil or seeds?

I would say less intensive good yield for me is best. My priority for seed and oil is equal, so I was hoping to get one variety of each type rather than a dual purpose (if that exists).

Su Ba wrote:This spring will be my own adventure into sunflowers. My primary reason is the pollen for the bees. Next in line is feed for the livestock. Third, a source of sunflower oil.

So far I've noticed that there are numerous varieties being grown for the flower industry. While they might be pretty and not so tall, most are "pollen less". Soil going to have to be careful in choosing my varieties.

I also want to attract bees and I did notice several pollenless varieties. That's why I figured I better check with the people here on this site to get my info rather than other sources which seem to be geared toward commercial rather than sustainable.

A good variety for an oilseed is 'Peredovik', which is the most common variety grown in Russia and the Ukraine. It is all black and the seeds are somewhat smaller than the zebra striped ones that are common here, but they are still good eating, and are very popular to snack on.

Here is a source that I have ordered from.

id go for a variety that has good head size and seed size, large plants. you get higher yields from smaller plants that get cut every few days for ripe seed heads but when you have a few hundred plants its a task and a half. when you have a few hundred large heads its easy to come by with a billhook or machete and whack them off in one swipe each.

cant help you on variety sorry.

I plan to order the Peredovic from Southern Exposure for oil. For confectionery seeds, they have Mammoth on that site. I will probably just order that one too, unless someone else has a suggestion for a better confectionery variety?

Jordan Lowery wrote:id go for a variety that has good head size and seed size, large plants. you get higher yields from smaller plants that get cut every few days for ripe seed heads but when you have a few hundred plants its a task and a half. when you have a few hundred large heads its easy to come by with a billhook or machete and whack them off in one swipe each.

cant help you on variety sorry.

Hi Jordan, what is considered a good head size? The one I found, Mammoth, has an average of 11" across. Is that considered big?