Home Exhibition Hall Photo Album Digital Camera Tip & Trick About Me Enter your search terms Submit search form This website is best view in Firefox resolution 1024x768 pixels The sunflower is an annual plant native to the North America in the family Asteraceae, with a large flowering head. The stem of the flower can grow as high as 3 metres tall, with the flower head reaching up to 30 cm in diameter with the "large" seeds. What is usually called the flower is actually a head of numerous florets crowded together. The outer flowers are the ray florets and can be yellow, maroon, orange, or other colors, and are sterile. The florets inside the circular head are called disc florets. The disc florets mature into what are traditionally called "sunflower seeds", but are actually the fruit of the plant. The true seeds are encased in an inedible husk. Sunflowers in the bud stage exhibit heliotropism. At sunrise, the faces of most sunflowers are turned towards the east. Over the course of the day, they move to track the sun from east to west, while at night they return to an eastward orientation. This motion is performed by motor cells in the pulvinus, a flexible segment of the stem just below the bud. As the bud stage ends, the stem stiffens and the blooming stage is reached. To grow well, sunflowers need full sun. They grow best in fertile, moist, well-drained soil with a lot of mulch. Sunflower "whole seed" (fruit) are sold as a snack food after roasting within heated ovens with or without salt added. Sunflowers can be processed into a peanut butter alternative, Sunbutter, especially in China, Russia, the United States, the Middle East and Europe. It is also sold as food for birds and can be used directly in cooking and salads. Commercially available sunflower varieties contain from 39 to 49% oil in the seed, Sunflower seed is the third largest source of vegetable oil worldwide, following soybean and palm. The growth of sunflower as an oilseed crop has rivaled that of soybean. The oil accounts for 80% of the value of the sunflower crop, as contrasted with soybean which derives most of its value from the meal. Sunflower oil is generally considered a premium oil because of its light color, high level of unsaturated fatty acids and lack of linolenic acid, bland flavor and high smoke points. The primary fatty acids in the oil are oleic and linoleic (typically 90% unsaturated fatty acids), with the remainder consisting of palmitic and stearic saturated fatty acids. The primary use is as a salad and cooking oil or in margarine. It also is used as a carrier oil and to produce biodiesel. The cake remaining after the seeds have been processed for oil is used as a livestock feed. Pictures in this photo album were taken by digital camera and resized to 1600x1197. Click the pictures to enlarge Size: 111 Kb Size: 166 Kb Size: 217 Kb Size: 145 Kb Size: 98 Kb Size: 159 Kb Size: 371 Kb Size: 167 Kb Size: 162 Kb Size: 126 Kb Size: 232 Kb Size: 143 Kb Size: 383 Kb Size: 191 Kb Size: 204 Kb Size: 176 Kb Size: 326 Kb Size: 156 Kb Size: 268 Kb Size: 189 Kb Enter your search terms Submit search form This website is hosted by www.agilityhoster.com (C) 2007-2008 All rights reserved.