The Best Way To Harvest Seeds From Your Sunflower Plant

Is any flower more synonymous with late summer and early fall than the common sunflower? Their giant, sunshiny blooms are enough to make anyone smile. Growing your own picture-perfect sunflowers just in time for fall is rewarding, and they have the added benefit of being one of the easiest flowers to save seeds from. The seeds can be planted for next year's garden or enjoyed as a tasty snack. The process is straightforward: just wait until the flower is ready, cut the seed head off, place it in a warm, dry location for a couple of days, and then collect your seeds for storing or roasting. Of course, there's a little more to it than that.

Sunflowers are an extremely versatile flower — they make a beautiful bouquet and can provide a perfect fall snack.  And sunflower seeds offer many health benefits, such as promoting a healthy heart, providing anti-cancer nutrients, supporting a healthy thyroid, and helping to fight inflammation and muscle cramps. These benefits alone make saving your own seeds for snacking worthwhile. And saving some of your seed to replant next spring means you'll have an endless supply of healthy treats to munch on.

The first step in harvesting seeds from your sunflower plant is knowing when and how to extract their seeds. Some say you should leave the seed heads on the plant to dry naturally, but one tip for preventing your sunflowers from becoming bird food is to cut them and dry them inside. But what signs should you look for to know that your sunflowers are ready to harvest? The main sign is when their seed head begins to droop and the back of it turns yellow/brown.

The first thing to do is cut the stalk just below the flower. You may want to bring a bucket or bag to collect the seed heads because you may lose seeds just by collecting the flowers. Bring your seed heads indoors and prepare an area to allow them to finish drying. You can hang them in bundles to dry or lay them out on a table. Once completely dry, after about 3 to 4 days, remove the seeds from the flower head with your hand or a spoon. Collect them on a paper towel-lined tray, because you will want them to dry flat for another day or two. Once completely dried, collect the seeds you want to save in a paper envelope and label it for next year.

If you are using them to snack on, you can skip the second drying stage and move on to roasting. Whether you prefer shell on or shell off, if you want them salted, you will need to soak them in salt water overnight (salt to taste). Then spread your seeds on a baking sheet, preheat your oven to 300 degrees Fahrenheit, bake for 40 minutes (or until golden brown), allow them to cool, and enjoy!