Throughout the year, we collect seeds from wild native Texas plants we see through our travels. We make agreements with landowners and get permission for collection. I hand-clean and prep each seed type to the best of my knowledge, and store them in my seed library. I also purchase seed from other collectors. I’ve amassed a few species of Milkweed, one of the darlings of conservation in the monarch discussion.
This year, I am working Asclepias tuberosa (aka butterfly milkweed, pleurisy root, and probably many more common names), Asclepias variegata (redring milkweed), and Asclepias englmanni (Englemann’s milkweed – sidenote, did you know this naturalist deployed others to discover many of the plants named after him?). Asclepias are one of the first seeds I began doing propagation work with, as they were plentiful and I had lots of opportunity for trial and error. I have found that for me, I learn better if I can figure out the how and why of things with some hands-on guidance. I also found it a bit difficult to find people with direct germination experience, and words on a screen did not go as in depth as I would like. I am trying to change that through writing about my experiences with seed germination.
So, I have had this Englemann’s milkweed seed for several years, but with our move up in the air for so long, I never got the chance to work with it. I changed that this year. I have about an 85% success rate for germinating milkweed seeds, and I only collected a handful of this species. It was west of DFW, and now that we live significantly further east of DFW, I am unsure how this species will do here. I would love to establish parent plants to collect seed from to help get the genetics of this species better represented in cultivation circles. I don’t know if I have the skill or climate to do that here in East Texas. I will try though! Maybe some day I will find a restoration entity that I can partner with to help distribute these kinds of genetics. For now, I am just seeing what sticks out here in the Post Oak Savannah.
One of the biggest things I noticed when repotting these tiny plants, is their huge roots! We have all heard discussions on how native plants are better for our area, which, makes total sense. Those plants are used to living here. There’s good reasons why. their roots reach deep. It helps them persevere through our long, hot, dry summers. Year after year, milkweeds come back. In the same spot. Due to their hardy tuberous roots. I could even imagine that monarchs, like sea turtles, return to the milkweed of their hatching. Using the milkweeds as a map to help them through their migration. Of course, this thought isn’t even a hypothesis, but we don’t know what we don’t know.
In any case, I am happy to be working with these lovely plants, and I am excited to see what the future holds.
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