Wife has been raising Monarch butterflies this summer. I stopped at a vacant lot on the way home from work Friday-a-week-ago to pick a couple of milkweeds to feed her caterpillars, and I noticed this field had a
*lot* of different wildflowers amongst the grass and red clover. Including Asclepias tuberosa, which I've never seen growing up here (Minnesota) Much prettier than the swamp milkweeds and common milkweeds that are everywhere. I made a mental note where the plants were so I could find them in a month or two to collect seeds.We went there Monday evening and found 2 caterpillars and half dozen eggs -- on the ugly common milkweeds. They are in the terrarium now.
Tuesday I drove past the field and it had been mowed. :-(
I have read that A. tuberosa is hard to transplant; I'm wondering if that might just be the seedlings. Went to wildflowers.org and it says they are best propagated by root cuttings. They take several years to bloom from seed, so I know these plants have been there for a while and one or two mowings won't kill them. Just wonder if anyone has tried transplanting them from the wild, or sliced one up into root cuttings?
Thanks, Bob