Tiny and Not So Tiny

I have always been fascinated by the myriad ways in which plants grow and distribute seeds to perpetuate themselves. I remember doing a whole presentation for a third grade class when I was a student teacher in Berkeley. I think I had much more fun collecting different seeds and figuring out how they turned into plants than the kids did!

The gigantic sunflower in our garden, undoubtedly grown from  a seed eaten by a bird and expelled by said bird in our veggie garden, has now fully opened, but it is the leaves the birds eat. I put a couple of pictures in extras.

The Jerusalem Sage produces flowers that my Friend Lady Findhorn said looked like 'little old men with bad haircuts.' The stem continues to grow out of the center of the seed pod to produce another blossom. I'm  intrigued by the hairy, slightly sticky seedpods I've never seen bees on them but perhaps the hairs lure some other bug into the seed pod for pollination. There is more of a story here but I haven't looked into it yet. It is supposed to do well in 'dry, arid climates' and do will in 'problem locations'. Our dry rocky hill certainly is both and this plant does thrive there.