Tallest Sunflower Breaks Guinness World Records

The tallest sunflower ever has been grown!

The Guinness World Records team has announced that after 10 years, “the record for the tallest sunflower has finally succumbed to a monster bloom grown in the backyard of a family from Fort Wayne, Indiana, USA.

Nicknamed “Clover”, the skyscraping sunflower was nurtured by Alex Babich (USA, b. Ukraine) – a landscape gardener, seed seller and outdoor gear designer – along with some green-fingered support from his family.”  His son Keenai  found four leaf clovers and put it on the growing sunflower which brought luck and the record breaking sunflower’s name.

Babich began a more concerted effort to nurture sunflowers to record-setting proportions seven years ago. Using a combination of seeds from his tallest specimens to constantly refine the genetic line, as well as exchanging seeds from other giant sunflowers with other enthusiasts across the globe, his world-record goal inched ever closer.

He hopes to encourage others to grow sunflowers – an easy plant to grow.

How big is it?  “This is almost double the height of the iconic statue of Abraham Lincoln in the Lincoln Memorial, or easily tall enough to reach the rooftop of a typical three-storey house.,” noted writer Adam Millwood.

How did Babich grow this sunflower? “When the growing season started, my wife [Nannette] told me that she will pray that I would crush the world record this year, so that I could take a year off competitive growing and we could go camping more during the summer. “I started laughing, telling her, ‘There’s no way I can grow a 30-foot flower!’ But she was serious. So I gave her my word that, if I beat the record by a substantial number, I’d take a year off. Well, her prayer was answered… God works in mysterious ways.”

“Our family motto has always been: ‘Plant a Seed. Water with Love. Watch Hope Grow.’”

Although the sunflower is Ukraine’s national flower – it originally was grown in the U.S. Because of lent, Ukrainians couldn’t have butter – but with sunflowers they could use sunflower oil instead. Some seeds that arrived were grown the people loved the flowers. Soon fields grew and the country started exporting sunflower oil – becoming the largest exporter in the world.

Babich and his family. moved ot the USA in 1991, following the Chernobyl nuclear disaster and have planted roots here.

Now this sunflower is bringing people together and there will be a documentary about growing it in 2026.

 

https://www.guinnessworldrecords.com/news/2025/9/tallest-sunflower-as-high-as-a-three-storey-house-topples-decade-old-record