Horticulture Highlight: Milkweed
…Now soon the monarchs will be drifting south,
and then the geese will go, then one day
the little garden birds will not be here…
-Howard Nemerov
Recently while at the Wildflower Meadow & Pollinator Habitat surrounding our Washington Tower, we lingered to contemplate a Milkweed, Asclepias syriaca, and how passing time has brought a more positive opinion towards this one time commonly dismissed “weed”. Today, increased public knowledge that milkweeds serve as preferred food for the caterpillars of monarch butterflies (Danaus plexippus), has turned countless former opponents into its protectors and even planters.
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