By: Hettie Basil Lighttower
Here’s another plant we can easily recognize in the fall: milkweed. It gets recognized by its huge seed pods bursting and disbursing fluffy circles riding on the wind swirling out from a big gob of fluff! Last week we talked about how to identify goldenrod and its amazing uses. But milkweed has its own magic about it. Being a life support system for the monarch butterfly is only one of the many many roles it has played throughout history. Let’s take a look…..
First, I would like to mention that when I was a kid I became aware very early on of milkweed in the fall. My grandmother would say there goes a Santa Claus and like a kitten with quick reflexes grabbed the fluffy circle swirling towards us on the wind. She cupped it in her hand, motioned for me to do the same, “make a wish!!”she directed, while handing it to me in my cupped hands. I made the wish, was mystified and hopeful as I released it upon her next instruction, “now let it go!”. And I watched it with her as it flew away and seemed to have a more deliberate flight and a clear mission to honor and deliver the message it just received from me. That was milkweed. It was my earliest memory of it and of identifying it.
As I approached fourth grade and started raising monarch butterflies, I soon could identify common milkweed with or without the fluff; with or without the bloom. I got quite good at it. It wasn’t until my early twenties and I had moved to North Carolina that I learned there were different species of milkweed. All this time I thought Common Milkweed was all that existed. You see I had monarch caterpillars to feed and I was in a panic because I couldn’t find enough food for them. Surely, there’s milkweed somewhere!!!! So, I went to a local monarch hobbyist who also reared them and asked where their secret patch was so I could partake just enough to save my caterpillars. I was shocked when I got introduced to Ice Ballet and Swamp milkweed!!! They looked nothing like the milkweed I had known all my life.
Fast-forward, there are a recorded 77 species of milkweed in the US! I learned this later once the internet came to be. But in the meantime, I was now familiar with three species. I moved back to West Virginia and traveled a certain route for my job in my thirties, I kept seeing this gorgeous orange plant along the road. Finally, one day on my way home I stopped and with a shovel I remembered to bring, proceded to dig up this dynamic orange blooming plant. All of the sudden, I stopped, looked, looked closer and by now I had been rearing monarchs for 20 years so I couldn’t mistake the monarch caterpillars I was seeing on this mysterious orange beauty! What? This isn’t even milkweed. These caterpillars only eat milkweed, why are they eating this plant?? No milky sap comes out of it, it has fuzzy stems, narrow leaves and it is orange bloomed, not mauve or pink or white like the three milkweeds I know. I was very confused. But I dug it up and brought it home anyway. Soon afterwards, I learned IT WAS MILKWEED. It just was not sappy like the rest. Now I was fascinated.
I did more research. I learned that this orange milkweed had a great history! Its nickname was pleurisy root. Its scientific name is asclepias tuberosa. All milkweed species start with the word ‘asclepias’. Decades ago, centuries ago, its root was made into a tea that remedied pleurisy, tuberculosis, bronchitis, pneumonia, and any other lung problems because it is an expectorant. It was a very special plant. In current times it has acquired a new nickname: “Butterfly Weed”, because in the field all species of butterflies flock to it for its amazing nectar source more than any other flower in the field. But all the while it could save a life.
Butterfly Weed is not the only milkweed that can save a life! Common Milkweed ‘asclepias syriaca’ was used during WWII to make life preservers and vests!!! The fluff from their seeds, called floss, is extremely buoyant. Citizens who would separate the seed from the floss and bag it up and bring it to a hub got paid for the floss. I had the honor of meeting a gentleman who was a young kid during the war and he told me his story of how he did this to save the soldiers. He spoke of how the floss was collected and used to make life preservers and life vests, that is was ultra-light weight and trapped air between its layers which made it mostly waterproof. I counted it such an honor to meet this walking piece of history. I got my picture taken with him and he modestly giggled about it, but I marveled at his story and experience with milkweed. Plus, I knew how difficult it is to deal with milkweed floss and I couldn’t imagine trying to bag up a quantitative amount of that flimsy fly-away ‘santa claus’ fluff. That was just incredible. And it worked. Men were saved and didn’t drown because of this process. What a team effort. A young boy had an opportunity to assist soldiers in a real way.
There’s more, but we are out of time and can finish this next week. Send in your notions and comments to [email protected]. I will include them in the next available column as per their arrival relative to the publication deadline of Tuesday by 12 p.m. of the same week. If you wish to be anonymous let me know. Kindness is contagious~*