The sunflowers at Grinter Farms are continuing to open and people have about two weeks to get to the farm to experience their color.
This year, there are about 50 acres total of flowers in two separate fields at the farm at 24154 Stillwell Road in Lawrence, compared to last year’s 35 acres.
“The sunflowers will keep on getting bigger because they’re filling up with seed,” farmer Ted Grinter said. “That whole field will almost look yellow. You’ll hardly see the green, whenever they’re fully out.”
Grinter’s dad began planting sunflowers in the ‘70s in hopes of making biodiesel, but when that didn’t work out, they kept planting them anyway. Now, visiting the fields of sunflowers has become an annual tradition for many.
MarJean Shute of Independence visited the fields for the first time Thursday, but said this may become a yearly tradition now.
She said she’s seen plenty of sunflowers, but Grinter is a different experience.
“I think just seeing them all together in one spot, I’ve never seen anything [like it],” she said.
This is not the case for Overland Park resident Patricia Berning and her sister Pam Ekey from Missouri. They grew up with fields of sunflowers that their grandfather planted in western Kansas, so Grinter serves as a reminder of those times.
“We would go play among the sunflowers every summer,” Ekey said.
Berning has used the spot for photographing graduating seniors and said it is a blessing that the owners welcome people to the field.
“They could keep people away, but yet, I think it’s so kind of them to open this up and let people look,” Berning siad.
The goal is usually to have the flowers popping open in time for Labor Day. This year, due to wet soil, Grinter was three days late to the usual planting date. He ended up getting the sunflowers in about five hours on July 13.
“After they were in the ground, [the rain] didn’t hurt anything, really, but getting them in the ground was the hardest part,” he said.
Grinter Farms makes most of its money on corn and soybeans, and the sunflowers usually break even. It’s more of a passion project for them. After the flowers burn up, they are sent to a store to be made into birdseed.
There is a general store alongside the fields, which sells locally made goods, soaps, farm merchandise, crocheted animals and more.
“If you want to go Christmas shopping, we’re a place to stop,” Grinter said.
The store will be open 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. every day until Sept. 20 when it goes to weekends only.
When only a few flowers had opened over the holiday weekend, the farm had some issues with people cutting and taking flowers when there weren’t many people traveling to the fields to look at the flowers.
People are not encouraged to pick flowers, but if they do, there are red donation boxes. People are asked to pay $1 per flower.
Parking and entrance is free, and there are no bathrooms at the farm. Here is the full list of rules posted on Facebook.
Reach reporter Sara Maloney at [email protected].
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