Growing False or Ox Eye Sunflower Heliopsis helianthoides

Brighten the summer garden and bring in the pollinators with the North American native Ox Eye Sunflower.

Hardy in zones 3 to 8 this versatile perennial grows best in full sun and tolerates a wide range of soils. Once established, it is drought tolerant.

You’ll find honeybees and many of our native bees as well as butterflies and other pollinators visiting the flowers.

The 3 to 5 feet tall plants are topped with yellow sunflower-like blooms with a deep golden yellow to orange yellow center. Do a bit of early season pruning to encourage compact growth. This will however delay flowering by a couple weeks.

This large perennial does not spread by rhizomes but will reseed readily. Deadheading along with harvesting blooms for cut flowers can help contain the spread. Include it in cutting, wildflower and meadow gardens

A bit more information: Heliopsis flowers look like sunflowers but both the center disk flowers and petal-like ray florets of this flower head are fertile and produce seeds. Sunflowers petal-like ray flowers are not fertile and only the disk florets in the center produce seeds.

Tags

butterflies bees drought heliopsis

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