Plant in full sun to light shade and give little to regular irrigation - the more you water the bigger it gets. Cut to the ground in late fall or early winter. Hardy into zone 4 (<-20). This wild plant is attractive and fun in the garden. It stays constrained in gardens that are kept fairly dry but where is gets regular irrigation it can be fairly aggressive and spreading, so in irrigated gardens is best where it has room to roam in the back of a border or deep in the meadow.

Helianthus giganteus is native to the eastern United States and eastern and central Canada, from Newfoundland west to Alberta south to Minnesota, Mississippi, and South Carolina where it typically is found in valley bottoms in moist soil or wet meadows. The name of the genus comes from the Greek words 'helios' meaning "sun" and 'anthos' meaning "flower" because its round flower heads in combination with the ligules look like the Sun. The specific epithet is a reference to the large size of this plant.

We received this plant from John Greenlee and it has grown in our garden for many years - all who saw in flowering in the fall were impressed with its tall snaking stems bearing cheery yellow flowers so we finally put up crops of it in 2021 and sold it until closing the nursery in 2025. 

The information displayed on this page about Helianthus giganteus is based on our research conducted about this plant from books in our nursery library as well as from information that is provided by reliable online resources. We also have included our own observations made about it as it grew in the nursery gardens and other gardens visited, as well how the crops of this plant performed in the containers when we had them in our nursery field. We also include comments received from others and welcome hearing from anyone who has information about this plant, particularly if it includes cultural information aiding others to better grow it.