Sunflower as mandala

Maturing disk flowers of Helianthus annuus; click for greater detail.

If you thought we were done with sunflowers* for this year, you may rethink your thinking. In spite of the drought in Texas, sunflowers have been thriving in Austin for months, and I’ve kept photographing them. Over the next few weeks I’ll sprinkle some sunflower pictures, whether recent or from seasons past, into whatever other species we’re looking at.

This oval mandala shows the universe in the maturing disk of a sunflower that was growing wild on the prairie at Austin’s former Mueller Airport in mid-June of this year.

© 2011 Steven Schwartzman

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* Newcomers to this column, and those who never tire of sunflowers, may want to look back at the eight previous posts involving them:

Sunflower’s new leaves

Sunflower colony

Lady beetle

Predation on the rays of a sunflower

Just can’t get enough of those sunflowers

Fading sunflower blowing in the prairie wind

Sunflower stalk

Prairie redux