WILD SUNFLOWER (Helidnthus dnnuus, L.). Flower heads 

 3 to 5 inches across, with yellow rays and purple-brown disks, 

 borne singly at the branch ends; involucral bracts abruptly 

 narrowing to a slender point. Leaves 3 to 10 niches long, 

 mostly alternate and toothed, ovate, 3-ribbed from the base, 

 rough-hairy. A coarse, erect, branching annual, with rough, 

 often mottled stems, from 2 to 10 feet high, by roadsides and 

 on plains California to Washington, eastward to the Missouri 

 River. Blooming mostly in the autumn, but on the Pacific 

 Coast flowering almost all the year, often covering great areas 

 with gay bloom. 



The giant sunflower of gardens is a development from this 

 wild species, which from time immemorial has been a valuable 

 plant in the aboriginal economy. Indians from Canada to 

 Mexico cultivated wild sunflower as a crop, the seeds being 

 parched and ground into a meal which for nutrition and pal- 

 atability is said to be almost equal to cornmeal. The seeds 

 also yield an oil, which the aborigines used both dietetically 

 and as an ointment. The large, coarse stalks yield a utilizable 

 fibre, and from the flowers a good dye has been made. 



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