Annual sunflowers, likely the kind you bought, are native but have been extensively hybridized and bred for ornamental and food use.

They really need full sun, not just afternoon sun. It may be too hot by the wall or the air circulation there may be poor leaving it subject to fungal disease. Some sunflowers do need staking and there are a number of leaf diseases and insects will eat the leaves.

See the link below for further discussion.

Here is a link that might be useful: Sunflower Care

To quote the original poster:

"1. The main steam doesnÂt seem a thick as I would have thought it would be. Granted, itÂs thick in terms of comparing it against my other flowers, but IÂve had to use a tomatoes cage to support it. Is this normal? "

I've had similar "weak, floppy main stem" problems before, and I agree with Judy: the most likely cause is not enough sun (compared to the conditions that the plant is adapted to). I've even seen extreme cases where the stem of a normally tall plant, growing in a shady area, trails along the ground like a vine that can't find a "hold". This happened to my Senna marilandica in an area that got steadily shadier over several years (I removed the plant because had nowhere else to put it.)

Instead of another annual sunflower, consider a native, perennial, shade tolerant sunflower. September or October is a fine time to plant your new sunflower. This "solution" has several advantages: will grow straight in lower light levels (than the annual), native, wildlife beneficial, easy to maintain, comes back year after year.

My primary recommendations are the species Helianthus decapetalus (thin-leaved or forest sunflower) or Helianthus divaricatus (woodland sunflower).

Helianthus decapetalus
http://www.ct-botanical-society.org/galleries/helianthusdeca.html

Helianthus divaricatus
http://www.ct-botanical-society.org/galleries/helianthusdiva.html

Perennial Helianthus species typically have spreading root systems, however these two species are among the less aggressive spreaders.

lrobins... does the woodland sunflower make seeds that birds will eat?

Barb

All the sunflowers have seeds that birds will eat. Most native meadow plants do to. I leave all my plants up for the winter, cutting back in the spring.

Over the winter the juncos, sparrows and chickadees can be spotted eating seed from little blue stem, rudbeckia, ironweed, coneflower, asters, liatrus ...

For my region, there is a National Park Service website, "Chesapeake Bay Watershed Natives", that includes information on wildlife benefit of different species. According to their information, all listed species of true sunflowers (Helianthus) as well as black-eyed Susans (Rudbeckia) are especially beneficial to songbirds by providing edible seeds.

For example:
http://www.nps.gov/plants/pubs/chesapeake/plant/255.htm
http://www.nps.gov/plants/pubs/chesapeake/plant/1302.htm

(The icon of the bird with the musical note, under "Wildlife" at very bottom of the page, indicates benefit to songbirds.)

There are many types, sizes and colors of sunflowers. There are short ones, tall ones, yellow , burgandy and red ones. Big heads, little heads.

You probably dont'have the package so next year, read the packages before buying and it will telly ou how tall the plant should grow and what area it will grow best in. Sunflowers usually love sun.If you want tall sunflowers, mammoth is one of the taller ones witha big head and lots of seeds. I don't know if it is native.

And almost all of the sunflowers will start to bow the head when they are near there end, usual;ly the fall and the birds come to eat the seeds.

I use to see lots of ants on my sunflowers that had holes in them the leaves. I also had earwigs. Later I thought maybe aphids were doing damage because ants love to "milk" aphids.

Though it might be too large for your space, check out Lemon Queen sunflower. It grows 6-8 feet tall and almost as wide, It has hundreds of small yellow flowers that bloom for several months. The one in my yard has cypress vine (red flowers) twining through it and looks very pretty.