46 Nebraskaland • August-September 2025
ABOVE: On a cool late-summer morning, a northern paper wasp warms itself on a sunfl ower leaf.
OPPOSITE: Prairie meadow katydids, common in eastern Nebraska prairies, use their needle-like ovipositor
to lay eggs in plant stems and soil.
Y
ou've surely seen this tall, stout-stemmed
annual with broad leaves. It grows in road
ditches, pastures and other areas that aren't
farmed. Its late-summer flush of golden blooms is
hard to miss.
As its name implies, the common sunflower is
indeed common. But before modern agriculture —
with its 50-foot-wide cultivators, Roundup Ready
corn, soybeans and other crops, and a "not an odd
corner can be spared the plow" mindset — it was
even more so.
Back then, farmers, their kids and hired hands
spent long, hot, sweaty days earning blisters, hoe in
hand, chopping sunflowers and any other plant that
wasn't a crop from between the rows. The sunflower
competed with crops for moisture and sunlight, and
in the fall, its dry, tough stalks jammed harvesters.
Justly hated by farmers, it never shook its bad
reputation.
But those were different times, when biodiversity
was less appreciated. Overlooked in building its
reputation were the insects and wildlife that thrived
among sunflowers.
Now another confession. My wife, Grace,
and I promote the disrespected sunflower on
our southeastern South Dakota farm in a long-
abandoned crop field and a degraded prairie pasture.
In fall, we spray the smooth brome and Kentucky
bluegrass with the herbicide glyphosate. Both are
non-native grasses that dominate these sites. We
also graze the prairie in spring when the brome and
bluegrass are growing most actively. Both practices
reduce the non-natives, favor remnant native plants
and expose bare soil, which allows the sunflowers to
germinate and thrive for a couple of years until the
grasses regain control.
We fully accept the social consequences of our
behavior. We've heard through the grapevine that
our "weeds" are a source of local gossip. A visiting
cousin had the courage to say, "The pasture is
