Sunflower Highlights

Post Date: Sep 18 2023

Crop Progress - Monday, September 18, 2023

State	This Week	Last Week	Last Year	5 Year Average
North Dakota
Petals Dry	90	81	87	89
Bracts Yellow	69	48	65	70
Mature	29	14	29	31
South Dakota
Petals Dry	86	75	--	--
Bracts Yellow	49	33	--	--
Mature	7	2	--	--
Texas
Harvested	NQ	59	70	59

Crop Conditions - Monday, September 18, 2023

State	Timeframe	Very Poor	Poor	Fair	Good	Excellent
North Dakota	This week	1	6	31	59	3
	Last week	1	5	30	60	4
Minnesota	This week	0	3	37	59	1
	Last week	0	4	37	58	1
Colorado	This week	1	4	14	78	3
	Last week	0	1	11	83	5
South Dakota	This week	0	2	49	48	1
	Last week	2	5	43	47	3

Research grant applications being accepted

Research is an important part of the NSA’s mission. Each year, the NSA provides grants to public researchers to stimulate new or additional work that may result in lower production costs, increased quality, and higher yields. Pre-proposals for projects to be considered for funding in 2024 are now being accepted. Visit 2024 NSA Research Priorities (sunflowernsa.com) to read more and to submit pre-proposals. Grant applications are due by October 3, 2023.

Grower Report

Onida, SD grower Ryan Olson says his sunflowers look above average overall. He says the red seed weevil has been terrible. He had to spray 3 times and they would be gone for a couple days and then they were back. They have received spotty rain, with temps in the 70’s. Overall drier than normal. Most of his crop is close to full maturity. He hopes to start harvesting the second week of October.

Markets

According to the September USDA Farm Service Agency (FSA) crop acreage report, area planted to sunflower in 2023 totals 1,314,256 acres down 22 percent from last year. USDA National Agricultural Statistics Service (NASS) is using a similar planted acreage estimate of 1,347,000 acres. According to FSA, planted area of oil-type varieties is 1,160,825 acres with acreage of non-oil varieties, at 153,431 acres. NASS has pegged planted area of oil-type varieties at 1,183,000 million acres and non-oil varieties, at 164,000 acres. Wet spring planting conditions resulted in 29,343 prevent plant acres in 2023 with North Dakota accounting for 16,288 acres of the total. 2023 U.S. sunflower production is still undetermined and will not be known until harvest gets rolling and some yield results are reported. In October, USDA will provide its first estimate for oil and non-oil sunflower production. On September 30, USDA will report old crop sunflower stocks. These USDA reports will give producers and industry a better picture of sunflower fundamentals heading into the 2023/24 marketing year. The weather forecast for the next two weeks is predicting above normal temperatures in the sunflower growing region, which bodes well for crop dry down. Getting the crop harvested several weeks early can result in lower drying costs, plus reduces late season crop and blackbird damage.

NSA is an equal opportunity provider and employer. Anyone requesting special accommodation should notify NSA within a reasonable timeframe. NSA will accommodate reasonable requests.