Planting sunflower mazes on our farm this season is an exciting new adventure for us. In years gone by, we have planted sunflowers mainly in bird plots. Sunflowers offer many benefits to our farm, but we wanted to use them in a little different way this year…to have some fun Fall activities for our family and friends. In my mind, few things represent Fall better than sunflowers and pumpkins, and we’ve planted an abundance of both this year. We are excited to see how these mazes will develop over the next few months. Below I’ve outlined the process we used to build them.
Tilling the ground
The first step was preparing the ground. To accomplish this, Andrew first measured out the dimensions of the maze and marked the corners with stakes. He then tilled the outer perimeter, using his tractor and tiller attachment.
After the soil was tilled for the outer walls, he then measured out lines for the inner hallways. Again, he marked this using stakes to guide him. He tilled in straight lines, first making rows north and south, then east and west. The finished project looked like a giant checkerboard, as shown in the aerial drone photo below.
Planting the seeds
Next, Andrew put the seeds in the ground. We saved sunflower seeds from last year, so it didn’t cost us very much to put in our mazes. The biggest expense was our time. Andrew went online and generated some maze designs, and he used these as his guide so he knew where to plant the seeds. His Jang planter helped him to evenly plant the seeds.
Waiting for rain after planting our sunflower mazes
Next…we wait for the rain to come.
Our newly planted seeds are at the mercy of receiving rainfall to help them germinate. We use drip lines for much of our produce, but we pay for rural water. We can’t justify paying to water a sunflower maze that we planted for fun, so we hoped for adequate rainfall to sustain them. A little over a week after we planted them, the rain came. We got about 5 inches within a few days, which enabled our sunflowers to germinate well. We are excited to watch them grow over the next several weeks. It is so much fun to see all the different birds, butterflies, insects and wildlife that visit them. This year will be even more exciting as we get to share our flowers with family and friends who walk through our mazes. I will plan to do an update to this once they are blooming!
