The ones that produce the large seeds are Sunzilla (hybrid), Russian Mammoth, California Greystripe, and Mammoth. Birds are fond of the Black Oil variety. If you buy these multi-pound bags of them to feed to the birds, put 10 or 20 on a damp paper towel in a plastic bag and set it in a warm place to see if they will sprout. They probably will unless the seed has been heat-treated to prevent it. If you find some packaged or bulk human-edible large varieties that you like in the grocery section, get the 'raw, unsalted' type and test them, too. There are many seeds and grains that you can buy for human consumption that will grow, either for edible sprouts or growing in the garden, far cheaper than buying named varieties. Of course, if you want a named variety, you'll have to pay $3-4 for 20 seeds (or so), but the birds don't care. Sue

If I were back there (Branford) I'd have the seeds directly in the ground now. If weather was getting in the way of all that I'd germinate in the peat pellets. If weather was STILL in the way I'd put the pellets in cups with dirt once the roots started to get aggressive as the peat has no real nutritive value.

I grow loads of different sunflowers every summer, and am always open and interested in hearing about new varieties that I don't have yet. This is not the way to do it though! Besides I'd much rather hear about personal experiences with the flowers than a standard commercial blurb that one could get off just about any website. That's not why most of us come to this forum! Also I'd like to point out that "Indian Blanket" is a sunflower I grow, but GardenWeb informs me that it is not in their database because it is not a "recognized" cultivar, or something like that. They responded to me and said: "We cannot find any record of this cultivar having been registered anywhere. With all due respect, there are far too many nurseries that make up names and market them with no formal registration/patent...If you can locate the name of the person/nursery that registered/patented it and the year, we will be glad to include it. The information will have to come from a university.edu, or society or botanical garden.org, or something similar, not a commercial enterprise." Just FYI.

Sounds like a great idea to me.... Our bird seed sprouts all the time, so yours should too. We don't end up with a field of sunflowers, though. Lots of millet and weird looking plants. The sunflowers that don't get eaten will grow and you might get several different kinds, especially if you scatter enough to sprout and share with the critters I hope you'll show us a picture....we especially love Befores and Afters. Susie