July 20, 2010

Asclepius Summer

Two members of the Asclepius (milkweed family) growing near the house: butterfly weed (Asclepius tuberosa spp. terminalis) and antelope horns (Asclepius asperula).

I had to look up the botanical names, being normally happy just to remember the genus.

Its name comes from Asklepios, son of Apollo and god of medicine.

Antelope horns is definitely an odd-looking wildflower, with its green-turning-white petals.

Butterfly weed is a mainstay of high-altitude xeriscape gardening, but this one is wild. Monarch butterfly caterpillars feed on antelope horns in some areas.

3 comments:

HMS said...

Asclepius is a mainstay of the discerning gardener at any lattitude.

Charles, we'd like to invite you to become one of our Authors in Alexandria.

You may mirror your existing posts from here or elsewhere or produce original posts there, on anything you wish, as you desire. For your contributions and participation we will blogroll you with no reciprocation required. See our Guidelines for Authors for full details.

Come contribute your perspectives and opinions to the ongoing conversations there or, even better, start new ones of your own. Contact us through the site for full invitations and instructions.

Midwest Chick said...

Funny typo--you have Asklepios as the SUN of Apollo. Makes sense to me...

Chas S. Clifton said...

Paging Doktor Freud...