There are few things as iconic as the bright yellow sunflowers that span across the plains. While many individuals who travel past stop to enjoy the blooms, there is a lot of management that goes into creating this staple crop.
John Sandbakken, executive director of the National Sunflower Association, says in the latest Sunflower Extra column that, according to the latest USDA reports, the planted sunflower acres in the U.S. are up 38% in 2025.
In a recent From the Field episode of FP Next, Sandbakken goes in depth to share about the latest crop conditions, market insights and his expectations for the 2025 crop.
Weather challenges
“The crop is looking really good right now,” Sandbakken says. “If you look up into the Dakotas, we’re probably up into that 65% to 85% good-to-excellent category, according to the USDA.” Producers through Kansas, Nebraska, Texas and Oklahoma have struggled with drought in recent years, and Sandbakken says the crop looks great in those regions.
“It’s something of a rare occurrence that we’ve had such a great crop throughout the central U.S. this year,” he says. “When you look at the ratings, we’re only at about 3% poor or extremely poor, and it’s just a good crop overall.”
While a majority of the crop is excellent, growers have faced weather challenges in many regions. “It’s been kind of a roller coaster,” Sandbakken explains. “We’ve gone from really high temperatures down to freezing. In some cases, we’ve had situations where we didn’t get a lot of moisture. Now we’re at a point where there’s maybe too much moisture in some places.”
With too much moisture in some areas, Sandbakken says the disease concern grows. “We’ve had some warmer days, which helps get the moisture off those leaves,” he says. “But things producers should be looking out for right now is rust. The bloom period is one of the most susceptible periods for sunflowers for getting disease because when the blossoms are on, they can be infected by spores and different things.”
Rust is easily controlled with a fungicide application, but there are other diseases that shouldn’t be ignored. “We are always concerned for Phomopsis stem canker,” Sandbakken says. “That is a disease that gets into the stem of the plant and can cause early maturity, and that can sometimes impact your yield. For producers who haven’t reached the bloom stage yet, it wouldn’t be a bad idea to get a fungicide application in.”
Sclerotinia is another disease to watch for, but Sandbakken says there isn’t a management strategy to treat it. “Once the seeds form, if it gets into the head of that plant, it can be pretty devastating,” he says. “The thing producers can do for this, and many do, is look for resistant varieties to plant.”
As sunflower harvest looms, Sandbakken says he is optimistic. “It all looks pretty positive looking forward,” he says.
For more sunflower updates, check out Sandbakken’s Sunflower Extra column across Farm Progress publications.