Big, sunny, yellow flowers of sunflowers create uninterrupted beauty to almost any garden or a home with their huge blooms. Beautiful and dried flowers can be used in the best arrangements, crafts, and beautiful decorations. You must have special attachment toward those sunflowers, wanting to dry them down as well, so it becomes helpful to know the method of drying sunflowers to preserve their beauty. Below is the correct method of drying sunflowers for 2024.
Why Dry Sunflowers?
It is one of the reasons why dried, painted sunflowers are popular. They can be used for various design purposes. But for many home growers and floral lovers, it is more a matter of memory. Suppose it is to keep the memory of a summer garden intact, to make a green wreath, or to complement some particular detail of interior décor. In that regard, brugmanias are surely a great way to appreciate the particular flowers at any season.
A Good Time to Cut Sunflowers for Drying
Before drying, harvest sunflowers at the right time.
For Looks: Allow them to bloom completely but before beginning to wilt or shed petals. The petals should be attractive and the stem taut.
For seeds: Let the back of the sunflower head turn light brown and the seeds plump and loose easily.
Methods to dry sunflowers
Here are a few ways to dry sunflowers. Some methods will produce different results than others, depending on what you want to do with the flower.
Air Drying Sunflowers
Air drying is the easiest method, and also one of the most popular methods of preserving sunflowers.
Steps:
Cut the Sunflowers : All sunflowers should have been cut so that 12 – 18 inches of a stem is left. This means sunflowers should be very much easy to hang with it.
Remove Excessive Leaves: Leaves on this cut stem need to removed from the cut end totally, as it holds extra water and makes it muck up.
Tie the stems, hang them upside down in a cool, dark, well-ventilated place. Hang such flowers so that they do not lose their colours while drying in the sun. Let them dry out for 2–3 weeks. Check up on sunflowers from time to time about the presence of mold in petals or stems.
Finishing Touch: Once the flowers are completely dry, spray them very lightly with hairspray. In this manner, it will not chip off nor lose its form, as well as loose petals from falling off.
Oven Drying Sunflowers
This method may be used when you really do not have much time. Though faster, however, does little for coloring in sunflowers.
Step
Set oven to very low (about 150°F, 65°C).
Preparing the Flowers: Cut off sunflower heads and pull out extra stems.
Line with Parchment Paper and Place on a Baking Sheet: Place sunflowers on a baking sheet, so that the flowers don’t crowd into one another.
Dry: Put the tray in the oven, a little open for air to enter. Check on your flowers every half hour and take them out of the oven when they are dry. This takes about 2-4 hours depending on their size.
Microwaving Sunflowers
The best suitable method for tiny-sized flowers or petals is through microwaving.
Procedure:
Add Silica Gel: Put a layer of silica gel in the microwave-safe container. Place the sunflowers in the microwave-safe container, face-up. Smother them entirely with more silica gel.
Microwave: Microwave on low for 1-3 minutes. Occasionally check that you do not burn the flowers.
Cool Down: Let the flowers sit for 24 hours in the microwave-safe container after microwaving. Brush off silica gel with a brush lightly.
How to Dry Sunflowers
Once dry thoroughly, you will be able to keep sunflowers so that they maintain a relatively long-lasting condition.
Moisture Content to be Avoided: When kept dried, you have to make sure your sunflowers do not stay in moist or even mold-attracting locations.
Keeps them Air-Tight Containers: Keep them for some more months by using airtight containers where there will be an absence of moisture.
Direct Sunlight
Direct sunlight fades away the rich color of the petals of sunflower gradually, so ensure that the dried sunflowers are placed in a shade.
Creative Ideas with Dried Sunflowers
Decorate Your Home: Dry flowers are excellent material for creating wreaths, garlands, or an arrangement in a vase that gives your home that rural natural look.
Craft: Sunflower petals and heads are available for making potpourri, candle decorations or pressed flower art.
Seed Harvest: You can use the seeds in the bird feeders or store them when you dry sunflower heads for seeds for next planting season.
Conclusion
Sunflower drying is a process, though simple, lets one enjoy the beauty of sunflowers beyond the growing season. Whether preserved for decoration or seeds, these drying methods will help you achieve the best. Now that you know how to dry sunflowers in 2024, start your project and keep a little bit of summer with you all year long!
I am Amelia, a professional who is powerfully driven by an extreme passion for the minute intricacies of flowers and trees. Through years of rigorous studies and practical exposure to botany and horticulture, I managed to nurture expertise that cuts across the scientific and aesthetic fronts of plant life.