Sunflower belongs to a group of plants described as being facultative long day bloomers. What this means is, sunflower will eventually bloom during the 'short day' period of the life cycle, so long as cultural conditions don't prevent it. Day length/photoperiod impacts the blooming of most plants. Actually, it's the length of the night that triggers photoperiod blooming responses, but that's another discussion. Sunflower blooms faster/better when day length is longer than about 14 hours, but as noted, WILL bloom under short day conditions (when the dark period is longer than the light period) - just not as readily as during long day stretches. You don't say where you live, but if there is danger of their freezing within the next 2.5-3 months, I wouldn't bother planting, as frost will take them before they can reach bloom stage. So sorry about your brother. Al

Which mammoth variety are you looking for? I don't have that large of quantities (I wasn't able to harvest the seed crop on my mammoth varieties this year so what I have are '07 harvested). I have a small amount of the 'Russian Mammoth', a bit larger amount of the 'Mammoth Grey Stripe' and a fairly decent amount of the classic 'Mammoth'. Just let me know if any of those mammoth varieties are the one that you're looking for. ~Amanda

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linda, how are you going to shell them? Last year I didn't roast any of mine. I just washed them with plain water, and since I had a lot of rain at harvest some got a little moldy - and since they were all in the shell - I also sprayed them with a food grade sanitizing solution I use for wine making. I then dried them well and put them in a sealed gallon jar. I didn't have tons of them though... just enough to almost fill the gallon. I ate them all year. Even raw they were fine. The only ones that were bad were those that molded on the plant. I tried a couple of ways that were recommended for shelling and I was disappointed at the results. It would be nice to have them to bake with, and use in salads and such, but I need to find a way to shell them efficiently in bunches. This year I have a little more than twice the number of plants growing than last year. I lost about 1/4 of my plants to a critter, but still have a good number. The flowers on the earliest just opened up earlier this week. I think a little over half the plants left standing are now open.