Still planting sunflower seed for sprouts here in Upper Michigan

[Kaleva]

Planted them on the 20th and thought most would be gone 'cause I saw Chippy the Chipmunk digging for them later but this morning I saw many sprouting.

I'm just using regular bird seed sunflowers as we feed the birds year round and the seeds are from the bottom of the feeder when it's about empty.

The sprouts are tasty eaten by themselves of when added to a salad. And from what I've read, they are very nutritious.

I tried growing them in boxes indoors earlier this year but I thought the results weren't worth the effort.

When the weather got warm, I thought about just spreading some seeds over a small worked up area by the garage and that has done very well. I haven't bothered with pro-soaking as the plot has enough moisture from all the rains we've had this summer.

Next year, I plan on having 4-5 small sections dedicated to sunflower sprouts in the garden at the big house. I'll plant one section one week, the 2nd five or so days later and so on. That way I'll have a near continuous supply of sprouts during the growing season.

[lordsummerisle]

1. I've given up on sunflowers this year

I tried 4 separate plantings and the squirrels dug them up every single time. Up till now I never thought I could shoot an animal...

[Warpy]

2. Sunflower sprouts are good

but the ones I loved best on sandwiches when I was too poor to buy lettuce were buckwheat sprouts.

It's funny, I've never been crazy about the flavor of buckwheat but I do love the sprouts.

[Kaleva]

3. Big reason I went with sunflowers is that we already had the seeds for feeding the birds.