Why are sunflowers called sunflowers?
What a great question, I’m glad you asked!
The easy answer is that a sunflower is a flower that looks like the sun. A sun-looking flower! But if we dig a little deeper, we can unearth some fascinating sunflower truths!
Most plants have a common name, which is like a nickname. The common name is the name most of us use. Plants also have a scientific name, which is more formal and precise. We will look at both the common name for sunflower and its scientific name.
What are the common names for a sunflower?
The sunflower has several common names: sunflower, common sunflower, wild sunflower, or annual sunflower. Using just the common name for a plant can get confusing because the common name for the same plant can vary based on where you live. Or a plant can have several common names. Or the same common name could be used for totally different plants!
So, while we may think we are talking about the same plant when using the plants common name, there is a chance we are talking about totally different plants! We needed a solution to our plant naming problem. Enter Carl Linnaeus…
Many, many, many years ago Carl Linnaeus (1707-1778) thought it would be a good idea to solve the plant naming confusion by giving plants a binomial name. A binomial name has 2 parts to it (similar to first name + last name). The binomial name became the plants scientific name.
What is the scientific name for a sunflower?
The sunflower has a scientific name which is Helianthus. If you just skimmed over that word because it sounds Greek to you then you are correct! It is Greek! If we break that Greek word into easier parts we can see why it is the name for sunflower: The words that make up the word Helianthus are Helios + Anthus. Helios is Greek for sun and Anthus is Greek for flower!
Thus, the literal meaning of Helianthus is SUN FLOWER!
But according to our friend Carl Linnaeus, that was not specific enough. Helianthus needed a second name. So we are all on the same page for the naming of the sunflower we will take a brief look at how plants are named.
How do we name plants?
Do you remember back in school when you studied the Taxonomic Hierarchy of plants? Yeah, it was a blur for me too.
Well, bear with me…remember, we are digging for sunflower truth and we are now going to dig a little deeper.
All organisms are classified into one of six kingdoms (we can thank Carl L. for that). We are going to look at the very basics of the plant kingdom for our sunflowers. This information is great to know because it will help you understand specifics about plant names and the scientific name for the sunflower.
The Taxonomic Hierarchy is basically: Kingdom, Division, Class, Order, Family, Genus, and Species. Sound familiar now? I sorta remember studying it way back in school. And then I forgot all about it until I became interested in plants as an adult. Every grouping after Kingdom gets smaller and smaller until you are left with the smallest group, the species.
On the bright side, there will be no quiz! You do not have to memorize the Taxonomic Hierarchy! But we are going to take a look at it because we like to dig deep to unearth sunflower truth! Am I right?
What is the Taxonomic Hierarchy of the sunflower?
The Taxonomic Hierarchy specifically for the sunflower is:
Kingdom – Plantae (plant)
Division – Tracheophyta (vascular plants)
Class – Magnoliopsida (dicotelydon)
Order – Asterales (this has a complicated explanation but basically it is a smaller group of Magnoliopsida)
Family – Asteraceae (also complicated but it is a smaller group of Asterales)
Genus – the first name of a plant
Species – the last name of a plant
For the sunflower's name, we are only going to look at what comes after Family: Genus and Species. We already know the sunflower's first name (genus) is Helianthus. The genus Helianthus is divided into around 72ish species of sunflowers! The species of the common sunflower is Annuus, which means annual.
And now that we know the first and last name for the sunflower let me formally introduce you to the scientific name: Helianthus (first name/genus) annuus (last name/species). If you want to be able to pronounce it correctly (and, yes, you do!) follow this phonetic spelling: Hee-lee-AN-thus AN-yoo-us.
What are sunflower varieties?
The Helianthus annuus is broken down even further into varieties. There are over 70 varieties of annual sunflowers!
The variety of a flower is written in single ‘quotes’. If you look at a sunflower tag at a greenhouse you will most likely see the words: Helianthus annuus, followed by a word (variety) in single quotes and will look something like this: Helianthus annuus ‘Ring of Fire’. To decipher this name we know that Helianthus annuus is an annual sunflower. ‘Ring of Fire’ is the variety (and a song by Johnny Cash!). And just in case you were wondering, this variety is native to the U.S. and Central America. It grows 4-5 feet tall and is a bicolor (two-color) flower.
If you want a smaller annual sunflower, you might want to look for Helianthus annuus ‘Elf’. This variety has yellow blooms and only grows to 12-18 inches tall!
Now you can see how important it is to know what to look for in a sunflower’s name: its genus and species, plus its variety!
So now when someone asks you: "Why are sunflowers called sunflowers?" you can tell them about Carl, the importance of binomial names, and what Helianthus annuus means!
Or you can just point them to a sunflower and ask if they've ever noticed that a sunflower looks like a sun!
I hope you learned something new!
Sunflower Truths...
- Helianthus annuus is the scientific name for annual sunflowers. Annuals die at the end of their growing season and have to be replanted yearly.
- Sunflowers are native to North America.
- Sunflowers are grown for birdseed, oil, and human consumption...and I might add visual attractiveness!
- The genus of a plant is always capitalized. The species is written in all small letters and variety is written in single quotes.
- Sunflowers come from the Asteraceae family – this includes flowers like aster, daisy, and sunflowers. Asteraceae have flowers that look like individual flowers, but they are actually a cluster of smaller flowers!
- Perennial sunflowers will mostly have smaller flowers. Perennials come back every year on their own and because they are very hardy they can be considered invasive in some areas.
- A cultivar is a variety that was created by humans, not nature.
