A tower of flower.

Ever heard of flower power? Few flowers pack more punch than Helianthus (heel-ee-AN-thus), the sunflower.

Some people say talking to their plants makes them grow. But that's not easy, with a sunflower. Some can reach twenty feet. Katie Christian, eight, is finding that this sunflower is nearly nine feet tall, with plenty of time left in the growing season.

Surprise! The tightly-packed, sunflower on the left will produce nearly 2,000 individual seeds. Seeds develop from the tiny sunflower blooms jammed together on the face of the flower.

Clayton and Joshua Christian, five and two, find that sunflowers up close are nothing to be sneezed at.

More than sixty varieties of sunflowers grow all around the world. Not all are bright yellow like the noonday sun. Look carefully and you'll see pockets of yellow pollen bulging on the legs of this bumblebee.

"Bye-bye, sunflower," says Katie.

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