Blooming window: June – August

With long lasting bright orange flowers, it is one of the most popular milkweeds in home gardens. It is an important host plant for both Monarchs and Grey Hairstreaks butterflies. Mature plants can have a tap root that can extend a foot into the soil. They thrive in sandy and well drained loam soils and can be transplanted during dormancy.

Blooming window: June – August

Midsummer brings on a profusion of lavender-pink flowers. The sweet scented flowers attract and feed a large amount of pollinators. Its root rhizomes spread rapidly from seed and it is one of the fastest milkweeds to establish.

Blooming window: July – August

The fragrant pink flowers are known to attract hawk moths, swallowtail butterflies, greater fritillaries, monarch butterflies, skippers, bumble bees, and other numerous nectar-seekers - even an occasional hummingbird. It can grow well in moist-wet soils and is a welcome addition to sunny border gardens and water features. It can find a natural home in moist areas in yards.

Kentucky Pollinator Handbook. (2016). Retrieved from https://efotg.sc.egov.usda.gov/references/public/KY/KPH5a.pdf

Ollerton, J. (2006). Biological barter: patterns of specialization compared across different mutualisms. Plant-pollinator interactions: from specialization to generalization. University of Chicago Press, Chicago, 411-435.

Ollerton, J., Winfree, R., & Tarrant, S. (2011). How many flowering plants are pollinated by animals? Oikos, 120(3), 321-326.

Wratten, S. D., Gillespie, M., Decourtye, A., Mader, E., & Desneux, N. (2012). Pollinator habitat enhancement: benefits to other ecosystem services. Agriculture, Ecosystems & Environment, 159, 112-122.

Xerces Society for invertebrate Conservation. Retrieved from https://www.xerces.org/

United States Department of Agriculture. Retrieved from https://www.usda.gov/

Prairie Nursery. Retrieved from https://www.prairienursery.com/

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