Everwilde Farms - 50 Spider Milkweed Native Wildflower Seeds - Gold Vault Jumbo Seed Packet

Since it grows most commonly in Texas, this variety of milkweed provides monarch butterflies with a valuable source of nectar on their journey north from Mexico. This native wildflower produces curved green seed pods that gave it the common name of Green Antelopehorn, while the abundant white crab spiders that inhabit its blooms resulted in the name Spider Milkweed. In 1753, eminent botanist Carl Linnaeus gave this plant its Latin genus name, Asclepias. Asclepias, the name of the legendary Greek representation of medicine and healing, is especially appropriate since this plant formerly had various medicinal uses. In spite of its highly toxic nature, Spider Milkweed attracts flocks of butterflies; butterflies are immune to the plant’s poison, and actually become rather poisonous themselves as protection from predators.