We had a fantastic display of sunflowers at the bottom of the garden this year - it was a mystery where they came from until I discovered that someone had been deposting the parrot's droppings and cage waste around the place - and sunflower seeds are a major part of Polly's diet.
From the ridiculous to the sublime, in our series on flowers and art, the lecturer and author Justine Hopkins looks at the blooms immortalised by painters like Gaugin and van Gogh.