my mother-in-law bought this cute little sunflower kit which came w/ the pot, seeds, & vermiculite soil...however the packaging had an artistic looking sunflower & the paper instructions said it was a dwarf sunflower...what confuses me is the scientific name that was also listed on the paper...it said 'Helianthus annuus'...when i looked in the plantfiles on here the dwarf sunflower was listed as 'Helianthus pumilus'...now i saw another sunflower listed w/ 'Helianthus annuus' as a name & it was the teddy bear sunflower which said it also was known as the Sungold Dwarf/Dwarf Sungold...i'm curious to know if the packaging company was confused or made a typo...so i just wanted to know if anyone knows if there is another sunflower titled as 'dwarf sunflower' but also listed under the 'annuus' species...or if you think it was supposed to be the actual dwarf one or the teddy bear one?
i just want an idea to which version it is...cuz the dwarf is listed as a perennial whereas the teddy bear one is listed as an annual...which made me unsure where to post this question...i also don't know if either will be able to survive where i am...i live in a 10b zone
I'm confused about a certain type of sunflower
Common names for plants, that is, English words such as "dwarf sunflower" are not necessarily unique and can't necessarily be relied on to clearly communicate which plant you are referring to.
Only the actual genus and species name is reliable for identifying plants. (Please look up "genus" and "species" if you don't know what these words mean.)
So what I'm saying is that "dwarf sunflower" is a bogus name... it was simply a description of the particular Helianthus annua type you had, in other words, a short one.
Helianthus annua types are, categorically, annual plants. Other species in the Helianthus genus are perennials. "Sunflower" is the common name for plants in the genus Helianthus.
Hope this helps.
To add... the packaging company was not confused, nor in error.
Thank you so much!