{gallery}11_25_10/sunflowers{/gallery} Lyle Evelo of Powell checks out sunflower seeds after harvesting them with a combine Nov. 12. Evelo has grown sunflowers in the Powell area for several years. He was joined this year by other area farmers who tried sunflower crops for the first time. Tribune photo by Carla Wensky A cold snap gripping the Powell area the past few days won't damage sunflower seeds that haven't been harvested yet.Powell area growers producing sunflower seeds for Dahlgren Seed Co. of Minnesota are still working their fields, said grower Fred Hopkin. Unlike last year, a severe freeze doesn't signal the end of the harvest.

“It's not like sugar beets, when the ground freezes and it's over,” Hopkin said. Some plants may “shell out” in the wind and birds may get a few seeds, but the harvest will probably continue through December and possibly into January.

The harvest up to now has been pretty smooth, said Lyle Evelo, who has grown sunflower seeds for several years. Some fields on Heart Mountain weren't at the right moisture level to combine before this latest cold snap began last week. When it warms up to the 30s, those plants should be ready, he said.

Dahlgren Seed Co. is sending trucks to deliver the seeds to Minnesota, but many growers are storing their crop in bins until the trucks arrive, Hopkin said. Most use a grain bin, preferably with interior fans to move air across the seed. He said his sunflower seeds are at about 12 percent moisture and are drying in the bins.

“They like 10-11 percent ideally,” Hopkin said of Dahlgren Co. officials.

Hopkin grew sunflower seeds on ground where frozen sugar beets were not harvested last year.

“They did really well,” he said. Any nitrogen released late in the growing season by the leftover beets seemed to help the sunflower plants, he said.

Dahlgren plans to market the sunflower seeds as confectionary, for snacks and other human consumption. Earlier this year, company officials said seeds that don't meet confectionary standards may be used in birdseed.

Evelo said sunflowers did well in the Powell area this year. Growers had to learn as they went what equipment to use for harvesting the confectionary seeds.

Evelo said many growers adapted harvest equipment they already owned. Some equipment works better than others.

“For a lot of people, this is kind of an experiment to see if they want to stay in or not,” Evelo said, and they didn't want to invest too much at first.

“There's a learning curve,” he said. Sunflowers are “quite a bit different than other crops to harvest.”

Growers and company officials have been happy with the local yields and the quality of the sunflower seeds produced, Evelo said.

For confectionary sunflower seeds, 2,500 pounds per acre “is a good crop,” he said. “Some are getting more than that.”

And they taste great.

“The floor of the cab of my combine has a lot of shells on it,” he said.

Once the seeds are combined, the stalks can be plowed under or livestock can graze on them, Evelo said. Although some fields show seeds lying on the ground, those are usually empty shells that are sorted out of the combine with other chaff.

“Most that fall to the ground are empty seeds. They will not have a kernel in them,” Evelo said. “That's just normal.”