You can most certainly try to get viable seeds by keeping it going in water for a while and seeing what happens. If it was me at this point I'd figure I'd have nothing to lose. :O) We got hit with Hanna too. There's been lots of chopping happening here even though I have people coming over to see the gardens this weekend. Hope they have a great imagination. LOL!

Thank you Marie! Chris, yes I admit to liking the single stemmed ones 'slightly' better....now! I can see where I have gone wrong. The Hobbit was a gift from another UK member and was already twin trunked and had just begun to branch. With hindsight I should have realised that my views would change with time and I should have cut the trunks and rooted them individually, but I didn't. It's a good job Jades a quite forgiving and put up with all this brutality. However, I do find that both Hobbits and Gollums don't branch as readily as regular jades, even with pinching. Do any others observe this? GillUK

Sure looks like something that is heavy is breaking the flowers down. If the flowers are in their seed stage then it could be a flock of birds that are trying to get to the seeds. If the flowers are not in seed then there is no reason for any bird to bother them. Insects would be going for the leaves but I cannot recall too much damage to sunflowers by any pest at all. You have any two legged varmits around?

Squirrels are the culprit around here. I have bird feeders with sunflower seeds in them, and the squirrels pick up those that fall to the ground and 'plant them'.