Trial: Annual

Year Trialed: 2008

Good Qualities

Nice yellow orange color with dark center (6); Early to flower (2); Liked relative small size, good petal counts (more double); Easy to grow, good bloom size; Nothing special about this sunflower to distinguish it, it did not branch; The newer cultivars of sunflowers that keep appearing every year are an incremental improvement over the older cultivar and ‘Tavor Joy’ is typical of that change - nice presentation and has a more upright appearance longer; Nice plant height; Foliage removed easily, not many problems with breakage; Like its brethren, ‘Tavor Joy’ was a good solid performer, but the individual flowers were not anything to write home about, on a positive note, after cutting the main bloom, ‘Tavor Joy’ came back with 4-6 short but usable secondary stems that we utilized in our "mini" bouquets; Double row of petals around a brown/green center, flowers 6-8 inches in diameter, among the earlier flowering in trials; Really liked this variety; Very nice sunflower, preformed well; Worked well in arrangements; Standard orange sunflower.

Problems

None (2); Large green collar of smaller leaves around base of flower, which we removed; I really could not distinguish between any of these cultivars, or maybe I should say the differences were more subtle than I could see-I think that they were too large, really thick stems, big heads even when direct seeded; Slow start to bloom, but prolific side shoots once blooming began; Stems are somewhat short, but adequate for most floral work; Flowered much later than the other sunflowers in the test block; Height varies a lot; Standard orange sunflower, similar to many; Flowered at a short height, not easy to harvest, flowering not very uniform.

Similar Cultivars

‘Sunbright’ (2); Looks like ‘Sun4U Orange’; Many.

Comments

The Agridera submissions from Gloeckner all did well; Double petals are great! Fuller than other cultivars; Fine, but not worth switching to; Harvested between 7/22-8/20 (direct seeded in the field on May 28); Still favor ‘Sunbright’/’Sunbright Supreme’; I thought it was a single stem type and so I planted it close and did not pinch - to my delight, they gave a second flush of 3-4 small salable stems, perfect size for bouquet work; Flower head 6.5 inches; Moderately sensitive to daylength: short day reaction; Some flowers are deformed, flower diameter 6 in., smaller flower, medium stem thickness.

Postharvest

Remove leaves; We only used plain water; Keep the vase solution clean; Bleach and water.

See separate postharvest report for results from NC State University postharvest evaluations.

Trial Data

¹1 to 5 scale, with 5 being the best. Market ratings are based on sales to wholesalers, retailers, or final consumers direct.

Supplier

Fred C. Gloeckner Company 600 Mamaroneck Ave. Harrison, NY 10528-1613

Agridera Seeds & Agriculture Ltd.
Gedera, Israel