Do Sunflowers Have an Odor?

Odor and Color

• All flowers need pollen to be moved from the stamen, the male part of the blossom, to the pistil, the female part. Flowers need bees, butterflies and other insects, or birds and bats to carry the pollen. Flowers use odor or color to attract these pollinators. Bats fly at night and so need odor to attract them, not color. A small flower close to the ground may more likely evolve fragrance to attract pollinators. Sunflowers grow from 8 to 12 feet tall, so pollinating bees can see their yellow color from a great distance.

Self-Pollinating Sunflowers

• Many hybrid sunflower varieties are autogamous, meaning that their flowers do not require pollen from other flowers. In such cultivars, an odor to attract pollinating insects would not be necessary.

Sunflower Resin

• Sunflower seeds contain a resin that has a piney, clean fragrance. Sunflower seeds, leaves and stems all have this odor, but it is not the kind of pungent fragrance that many flowers have evolved to attract pollinators. If you put your nose close to a sunflower and inhale, it is the resin that you smell To fully appreciate this odor, crush a flower head to release the resins. Bees and other insects may well be attracted by the aroma of sunflower resin as well as by the vivid yellow color of the large flowers.

Commercial Sunflower Fragrance

• Perfume fragrances are obtained commercially from geraniums, narcissus, plumeria, and numerous other flowers. The "sunflower fragrance" touted for soaps, candles and perfumes is obtained by processing "essential oil" obtained from the seed, not an odor the plant uses to attract pollinating insects. An essential oil contains the distinctive odor of a plant. Frankincense and myrrh are examples of fragrances that are essential oils.