Heading Home - North Dakota

North Dakota Field 8x8

WELL, IT TURNS OUT that North Dakota - not South Dakota - is the No. 1 producer of sunflowers in the country. South Dakota is No. 2. Of course, we went to South Dakota in part for sunflowers, but mostly for Carol's dig at Paleo Adventures. 

We come back through North Dakota, which has a great attitude toward its sunflowers - the state recognizes that sunflower tourism is a thing, and the North Dakota Tourism Council has a regularly updated map on its website  that directs you to where the sunflowers are blooming. 

After a long drive through South Dakota, we stop in a North Dakota gas station that looks like it might be very dirty and scary. But we've been driving for a ways and at this point, necessity triumphs over perceived hygiene. To our delight, the station is surprisingly clean, and includes a restaurant of sorts. I ask a table full of older people (yes, I am probably as old as them) about any sunflower fields in bloom in the area, and they stop and think, then light up and give directions - the same directions I find on the map. 

We follow the directions and pull up to the first field we see that's blooming, and set up to paint. The sky is swirled with gray, and it seems that it might rain - and does, though not enough to get us wet. As I paint, almost no cars go by. Grasshoppers flit and jump, and we hear and see some large raptor, circling so high we can't tell what it is. While I'm in the middle of the painting above, I have an idea for the painting below, and end up painting both at more or less the same time, bending over the open back of the car, and finishing before any real rain starts. 

North Dakota Sunflowers No. 2, 4x12




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North Dakota




IN ADDITION TO BEING TOPS in the country for sunflower production, North Dakota is in the agricultural leader in:
  • Dry beans
  • Pinto beans
  • Canola
  • Flaxseed
  • Honey
  • Oats
  • Durum wheat 
  • Spring wheat

Almost 90 percent of the land in North Dakota is farms or ranches. That's about 39 million acres. Wheat and beef cattle are produced in all 53 counties in the state, according to a fact sheet put out by the North Dakota Department of Tourism. Cows outnumber people in North Dakota by 2 to 1. 

The largest grassland in the country - Little Missouri National Grassland, which is more than 1,000 acres - is in North Dakota. 

The state has 63 wildlife refuges, the most in the country. 

And there are about 500,000 bison in North Dakota, many in Theodore Roosevelt National Park. Honestly, the entire state is a revelation. 



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Person of the Day

IT'S MY GREAT-GRANDSON, JJ, who played in his first football game ever this weekend. My daughter Erika said JJ was nervous before the game, but got over it right away and played great! 

*** 
Dog of the Day
IT'S THE PAPA pheasant, on North Dakota's Enchanted Highway. More on the highway tomorrow, in the final edition of the Searching for Sunflowers blog. 









 

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