While rafting down the Snake River through Hell’s Canyon not that long ago, I kept spotting these small yellow flowers. At first glance they looked a little like a daisy, but were taller and with a fuller head,
Turns out these are wild sunflowers. I don’t recall ever seeing them before this encounter, although they are said to be common in North America. These are the non-cultivated cousins of the sunflowers we see planted in fields and which are used to produce sunflower oil and seeds for snacks and salads. They may have multiple heads, although the ones I saw generally had just one. They are edible but are generally much smaller than their commercial cousins. But a dab of appreciated color in the dry summer landscapes of western Idaho.
These are the wild relatives of the sunflowers that grow in fields; the cultivated sunflowers are the ones that make sunflower oil and the seeds