September 3, 2015
There is a new plant in the garden, Butterfly weed, Asclepias tuberosa, and goes by ‘Hello Yellow’. This plant blooms mid to late summer. The butterfly weed should be planted in full sun. When it is first planted, it needs to be watered two to three times a week until it is established. It grows twenty-four inches tall and about three feet wide. This little fellow is taking up residence right next to the butterfly bush down by the patio. I am trying to make it easy for the butterflies!
The flowers are flat-topped clusters of bright golden yellow petals that bloom above narrow, lance-shaped leaves. The dried seedpods can also make a unique accent in floral arrangements. Clearly, there are no flowers yet, but I have patience…
While the flowers of the butterfly weed are really pretty, that is not why this little plant found it’s way into my humble garden. We are encouraging the butterflies to frequent the garden. The butterfly weed is one of the species of milkweed where the monarch butterflies lay their eggs. What beautiful creatures they are! This summer we had a multitude of butterflies and I tried to take pictures of many. Some were so elusive!
I don’t have any pictures of the butterfly eggs, the caterpillars, or the chrysalis, but as soon as I do, I will share them. I do, however, have a picture of some aphids, which at first I thought were butterfly eggs. Yes, I was excited at first. They are not. Thinking they were eggs, I googled ‘the yellow eggs found on butterfly weed’ and someone mistakenly reported they were butterfly eggs. Wrong. Another example of you can’t believe everything you read on the internet.
Upon further investigation on other sites, I found that these were not eggs but Oleander aphids, which are common to the milkweed plants. Apparently, a few are not a big deal, but a large infestation can damage and stunt your plant. There are natural predators that eat the aphids. One of those is the ladybug beetle. This is another reason I need to get that ladybug house built! The location of that house will most assuredly be close to the milkweed plant!
The aphids are all female and don’t lay eggs. They clone themselves! How strange is that? If you magnify these, you can see they have skinny black legs. When I took this picture, I thought these were eggs. Blown up on the computer, I saw legs. That began my search that revealed these were not something I wanted.
Click here ► to read an article on the Oleander aphid.
These were relatively easy to knock off the plant with a spray of water from the hose. I smashed the few that remained with my fingers. They don’t have wings so they can’t fly and were easy to smash. Obviously, we don’t want to use chemicals and kill the butterflies, too!
All in all, I am excited to have this new plant, the butterfly weed, in my garden.
