7-year-old Islander grows huge sunflower as gift for his teacher

Jack and his beanstalk may have met his match with a P.E.I. boy who's grown a sunflower three times his size.

Seven-year-old Landon Jorritsma of Meadowbank grew the sunflower after his Grade 1 teacher gave him a gift bag of seeds this summer.

Landon went home, planted the seeds on his family's beef farm and tended to it over the months. With some patience and care, the sunflower continued to grow and reached more than 3.6 metres in height.

That's nearly the length of his family's van, he said.

On the first day of school this week he brought in his gargantuan flower and showed it to his teacher, Loretta Anderson.

"I was really surprised, I never expected a sunflower that big or tall," she said. "It was around 12-feet tall so when I saw it I was just amazed … and he was pretty proud of himself that he had grown that."

They tried to take a picture with it standing upright in the classroom but it was much too large for that.

Next project will be big too

Anderson said she hopes Landon and other students learn from growing their sunflowers, lessons about patience and care and taking care of something.

"I hope they would learn what a seed can do, and how it takes time to grow something. It's not just something that happens instantly," she said.

The ones back on the farm are even bigger.

Landon said he's "just going to let them grow" and see how tall they can get.

This little project sparked an interest in gardening for him, he said. He's not sure what he'll grow next, but when asked if it'll be big he said "yep."

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