The second annual Niagara Sunflower Festival kicked off this weekend at the London Born Wine Company in Beamsville.

The festival has nearly 70,000 flowers available for people to pick with proceeds going to Ukrainian relief.

Joe Hube and his colleague organized this volunteer event, and others like it, as a way to help raise money for Ukrainians in need.

Last year’s event raised nearly $7,000 for humanitarian charities.

“It was just in reaction to the rages of the war and the unfairness and the brutality, we felt motivated to try in our own little way to help somehow,” Hube said.

He said the decision to go with a sunflower was an easy one because it pays homage to Ukraine’s national flower

“The sunflower is the national flower of Ukraine and that made it important in the context of Ukraine. Also, I’ve had an inexplicable love for sunflowers my whole life.”

The sunflowers have been growing here for almost three months and the organizers say there’s about 70,000 of them planted on the farm. And if attendees have a ticket, they can even pick some flowers and take them home.

For the Ukrainian-Canadian community, they say they’re thankful for the ongoing support from organizations raising money to help Ukraine.

“It’s amazing. In the year and a half that this war has been going on, I’ve been totally dumbfounded by the number of non-Ukrainian organizations and charities that have supported Ukraine. It’s amazing,” Irene Newton said.

If you didn’t get a chance to see the sunflowers and support the fundraiser this weekend, they’ll be back again next weekend on Aug. 19 and 20.