The growth of the sunflowers

Text by Donald Davis

Photos by Kelley Ryan and Donald Davis

A perennial is a plant that returns every year using the previous year's root structure, such as the crocuses (above) and daffodils in Tompkins Square Park. 

Annuals, on the other hand, live and die their entire life cycle in a single year. They need annual planting, such as a field of corn, in which humans are involved. Nature, in its vastness, does quite well on its own. Some plants, like the sunflowers at Asser Levy School on First Avenue at 11th Street, work with their humans. 

This is what happened: The gardeners at the school practice regenerative horticulture and do not gather plants after they die. The soil at the surface and below is left undisturbed. In commercial agriculture, this is called no-till. 

The tree plot pictured below at 97 St. Mark's Place, between Avenue A and First Avenue, uses regenerative, healthy soil techniques (among the many plant species at 97 are sunflowers grown from seeds planted by people). Please note that in both situations, good fencing is a key element in the health of the plants and soil.

Last summer, a group of sunflowers grew tall right up next to the school building, where they should not have been. One can only guess how the seeds ended up there, perhaps by following a stream of water in heavy rain.

Text by Donald Davis

Photos by This proximity to the bricks created an angled, off-balance situation for the plants. Regardless of how unnatural the setting, the brave plants managed to grow and bud flowers, eventually attaining near full head size, which was their ultimate tragedy. 

In August, the weight of the heads pulled the plants away from the building to the ground. The sunflower heads, which had kissed the ground, were allowed to remain in that position through the fall and winter. What looks like an animal carcass in the photo is actually a decomposed sunflower head.

Part of the weathering process was the loosening of the black seeds, which began to germinate at or just below the soil surface. 

This spring, nature took over splendidly. You now have many sunflowers in the immediate vicinity where the heads fell, the start of a new generation of sunflowers from the wreckage of 2025.

The old plant structures are returning to the soil; their genetic line continues.