I planted a sunflower. It was the type that yield big heads and big seeds. The sunflower only got about 4 feet tall. It also made a couple of other small sunflowers.

When It does this should the small sunflowers be cut off so the main sunflower will grow taller? Or do some varieties just grow short, no matter how mnay small flowers they make?

Sunflower varieties range from 2' to 10' in height, so without knowing the variety, it's impossible to answer the question.

The vast majority of large-headed sunflowers grown for seed, however, are normally quite tall, so I'd think yours either got an extremely late start, is in poor soil, or didn't get enough water.

At this late date, I don't think it's going to make a whit of difference whether you remove the other flower heads or not.

Thanks.

Don't know the variety since they were from snack seeds. They were giant seed for eating.

Is there a commercial benefit to growing small sunflowers?

The eating ones are - as far as I know - the really tall ones. But again, there could be any number of reasons why yours didn't get really tall.

I know nothing about commercial sunflower growing, but will say that many market growers around here devote a goodly amount of space to the smaller sunflowers for the cut-flower market. The decorative varieties have become more & more popular within the past 10 years, & can command a very decent price.