The Question of the Summer: Sunflowers?

“Are you having a sunflower festival?” has been our most frequently asked question this summer by far. The short answer is, yes, we very much hope so! However, there is a whole other side to the story that makes it rather complicated. That story my friends, is the one I am here to share with you today.

Mother nature has been a beastie (for lack of a better word) this year.  Whoever put her in a BAD mood, if you would be so kind as to correct your wrong and make her happy again, we would greatly appreciate it. All jokes aside, this year really has given us a run for our money… lots of money.

As you all know, this year has been full of record breaking heat, and for the cherry on top, it’s been bone dry which for our sunflowers (and other crops) has not been good. Then we made some changes to our festival layout (meaning we switched some fields arounds) and needless to say, we didn’t nail the new layout. You would think that we would have learned by now that this one field doesn’t grow things very well.  But no, it has taken 3 not-so-successful crops (pumpkins, tulips, and sunflowers) to finally hit 3-strikes you’re out, and boy it is out for the count.  Live and eventually learn, I suppose was the case with us.

Once we realized that this sunflower crop wasn’t going to be successful, we cried, then cried some more, and then pulled our stressed-out selves together and came up with Plan B. Replanting (Plan B) is what we decided the best plan of action would be. All we had to do was fill in the thousands of holes in the plan. First, we had to come up with the most local reason as to why the sunflowers didn’t succeed. Luckily for us it could’ve only been a combination of a million things. We concluded that it was a combination of the extreme heat, water, and soil, (super easy fix…). Next came our plan of action.

Our main problem was that we grew such amazing sunflowers last year, (yes, I am going to toot our own horn -TOOT TOOT) that we knew you (along with ourselves) would not be satisfied with a “just ok” sunflower crop.  With this in mind we decided which field to replant and which varieties to include.  That information will remain a secret until we open because we have to leave somethings a surprise for when you come out .  Over the past few weeks we have been gathering supplies and are now ready for this much-anticipated week: replanting.  With that said, let us all right our wrongs with mother nature and PRAY for rain (and a miracle)!  Because we need her to play along with our plans, even if it is just a little. That way we can all reap the rewards of mother nature tolerating (if nothing else) us again.

We have been so grateful for every one’s excitement and questions about the sunflowers, (but please read the updates on the website, PLEASE) we feel so blessed to have so many people love and support our little family farm.  In return for the love and support we receive from you all, we hope (and pray) that we will be able to put on a beautiful and exceeds-expectations sunflower festival the beginning of September! You heard it, the beginning of September is when we plan to have sunflowers blooming, details with tickets and what you can expect will continue to come as our plans finalize!! Thank you for your continued support, it means the world to us here at the Cross E Ranch!