Looking for sunflowers or a cut-your-own bouquet experience on Long Island’s East End? The North Fork offers a concentrated mix of flower farms and farm stands, while South Fork farms offer seasonal bouquets, markets, and select flower experiences featuring late summer flowers.
By mid-summer, sunflowers often appear at East End farm stands and in seasonal fields. They line farm stands in bright bouquets, fill fields with yellow blooms, and give visitors a reason to slow down and make an afternoon of the North or South Fork. But sunflowers are only part of the story. East End flower farms also grow dahlias, zinnias, and other seasonal cut flowers, including late summer flowers, giving you plenty of ways to bring a little piece of summer home. Peak bloom and availability vary by farm, planting schedule, and weather.
You do not need a green thumb or a garden of your own. Pick up a ready-made bouquet at a farm stand, cut your own flowers at Horton’s Flower Farm, or plan a visit around a seasonal U-pick experience.
Did You Know?
A sunflower field does not necessarily bloom all at once. Depending on weather and variety, an individual sunflower planting may look its best for only a week or two. That is why a field can look completely different from one visit to the next.
Choose Your Flower Experience
Whether you want to make your own bouquet or simply pick one up on the way home, there are several ways to enjoy the East End’s late-summer flowers.
Cut Your Own Flowers
Horton’s Flower Farm in Mattituck is the clearest North Fork option for visitors who want to walk the rows and create their own bouquet. Thousands of blooms across dozens of varieties are grown for cutting and arranging, with what is in bloom changing throughout the season. Hours of operation are Saturday and Sunday 11am to 3pm July through early Fall.
Local Tip: If you have a particular flower in mind, check current availability before making the trip. The fields change as different plantings come into bloom.
Pick Up a Bouquet at a Farm Stand
Patty’s Berries and Bunches in Mattituck is a good farm-stand stop to check for seasonal flowers alongside its U-pick offerings. Latham Farms in Orient also grows flowers and may have seasonal blooms available at its farm stand.
North Fork Flower Farm in Southold is another option for specialty cut flowers. It is not a traditional U-pick farm, but visitors can check in at the barn, walk the flower fields and hoop houses, and select available flowers at the barn. They also hold monthly flower arranging workshops.
On the South Fork, Pike Farms in Sagaponack grows and sells seasonal cut flowers, including sunflowers. Fairview Farm at Mecox in Bridgehampton, Balsam Farms in Amagansett, and Amber Waves Farm in Amagansett may have seasonal flowers or cut-flower offerings, with availability changing throughout the season. At Amber Waves, pick-your-own flower access is offered to active CSA members, so visitors should check current options before planning a flower-focused stop.
Sunflowers in the Field
Rottkamp’s Fox Hollow Farm in Baiting Hollow has grown sunflowers for more than 25 years and has operated a seasonal sunflower maze since 2019. It is a wandering path rather than a puzzle, with photo props along the way and a farm stand out front. The fields open and close on short notice, so check before you go.
Labor Day weekend, The Milk Pail in Water Mill opens for U-pick apples, pumpkins and sunflowers through October.
Plan a Flower-Filled Farm Stand Drive
The North Fork makes it easy to turn a flower stop into a full afternoon. Start with a bouquet or a cut-your-own visit, then continue along Sound Avenue and Route 25 for seasonal produce, farm stands and local treats.
On the South Fork, the farms are spread farther apart, so choose a few stops and build the rest of your day around them. In either direction, late summer is a particularly good time to explore, when flowers share the stands with the season’s corn, tomatoes, peaches, berries and other fresh produce.
More Than Just a Pretty Flower
Sunflowers are part of the working farm landscape out here, not just the scenery. The Sidor family’s potato-farming roots on the North Fork date to 1910. North Fork Potato Chips, launched decades later, are kettle-cooked in sunflower oil. After sunflower-oil prices rose, the family experimented with growing sunflowers locally; in 2012, they turned one planting into a sunflower maze, which contemporary coverage described as Long Island’s first. The next time you spot a bag of those chips sitting next to a bucket of sunflowers at a farm stand, the two are more closely related than they look.
Before You Go
- Flower varieties and field conditions change throughout the season.
- Check current farm updates before making a special trip for a particular flower.
- If you are traveling with a bouquet, keep it shaded and cool and bring water for longer drives.
- A field that is in bloom is not necessarily open to the public.
Make It an Overnight
A flower-filled afternoon pairs easily with dinner and an overnight on the East End. Stay close to the farms you plan to visit and start the next morning with another farm stand stop while the day is still cool.
Explore where to stay across the North Fork, South Fork, Shelter Island, Montauk and Riverhead.
One Last Farm Stand Stop
Whether it is a handful of sunflowers from a farm stand or a bouquet you cut yourself, flowers are one of the simplest ways to take the East End home with you. Start with a flower stop, then leave room for whatever looks good that day: corn, peaches, tomatoes, or one more farm stand you had not planned to visit.