I buy sunflower seeds at the store for shoots, which is just bout the only fresh crop here in February-April.

This is great. I have an area where I'd like to grow a big bunch of sunflowers. The sunflower seeds sold as "SEEDS" are so uneconomical.

I have planted sunflower seeds that I got for birds. They grew good and am still getting volunteers from them. probably cheaper than food grade.

Don't assume they didn't use chemicals. You should check on that if you're concerned.

You're sure to get a standard variety. It leads me to wonder what would happen if you interplanted a bag of known-variety/seed catalogue Sunflowers. What kind of monsters could nature create?!

Actually store sunflower seeds are for snacks, which is what I'm looking to grow. I plan to grow an area of 8'x40' sunflower beds, mainly for harvesting seeds (food).

A lot of the known variety sunflowers are for ornamental only. It is going to expensive to source the real "seeds" from seed company....

Even though most sunflowers might be ornamental that doesn't mean that the seeds aren't edible. I grew a red "ornamental" variety (can't remember the name) several years ago and the seeds were very tasty (although they were smaller than those bred for eating).

But yeah, for the size garden you want the bulk raw seeds meant for eating would be a heck of a lot cheaper than buying seed meant for planting. If you want to check the viability of the bulk seeds do a germination test. Just sow x-amount of seeds in a small container and see how many sprout.

Rodney

I have more than 10 bags of old sunflower seeds, even the Russian Mammoth. All of them are smaller than the seeds I can buy from a supermarket.

Yes, I'll test plant some seeds in the winter inside to see if they germinate. I do not see the reason for the farmer to spray any chemicals. The only problem if the seeds are too old. But I think sunflower seeds can be good for a couple of years.

Because the black oil birdseed sunflower seeds are so inexpensive just buy another 25 or 50 lb. bag for next year and don't give it all to the birds. I plant it wit a 2-row tractor drawn corn planter (bean plates) and I'm cutting on my third planting for this year. Most people comment on how mich nicer the flowers are than the ones they are growing when I take to market. When I had mixed varieties on first planting (auction seed purchase) the majority of the customers preferred the generic birdseed sunflowers. So by all means plant them and expect about 50% of the flowers to be attractive enough to cut, same as for the expensive seeds. For each planting expect a 2-3 week cutting period before outer petals begin to drop; always best to cut flowers within a few days of first opening. Other flowers give you a slightly longer cutting window.