Genetic resources are the biological basis of global food security. Collection and preservation of wild relatives of important crop species such as sunflower provide the basic foundation to improve and sustain the crop. Acquisition through exploration is the initial step in the germplasm conservation process. There are 53 species of wild Helianthus (39 perennial and 14 annual) native to North America. An exploration covering 3700 km to the desert southwest United States in mid-June of 2015 led to the collection of five populations of H. deserticola (desert sunflower) and 10 H. anomalus (sand sunflower) accessions. All populations were collected throughout the broad distributional range of the species. Based on sand sunflower’s occurrence in desert sand dune habitats of Utah and Arizona it frequently has been recognized as drought tolerant with the largest achenes of any wild species and relatively high oil concentration potential and thus is a candidate for improving cultivated sunflower. Desert sunflower is a xerophytic annual species found in sandy soils underlain with clay soils on the floor of the Great Basin Desert in small populations in western Nevada west central Utah and along the border of Utah and Arizona. Population size habitat soil type seed set the presence of diseases and insects and other wild sunflower species located near the collection sites were recorded for each population. This germplasm will be important now and in the future as a genetic resource for the global sunflower crop and at the same time conserve it for future generations.