Milkweed Menageries

     As of this date, many common milkweed plants, which are native to North America, are full sized and in bloom in meadows, along country roadsides and in some peoples' flower gardens in southeastern Pennsylvania.  At this time, they have clusters of dusty-pink, waxy-looking, sweet-scented blossoms on top of their stems where a variety of bees, colorful butterflies and other kinds of visiting insects sip their nectar, pollinating those flowers in the process, and making patches of milkweeds more interesting to us. 
     Common milkweed plants host at least five kinds of insects through most of those insects' lives.  Those critters live on milkweeds and eat certain parts of their host plants.  And, interestingly, most of those milkweed insects are orange and black.  All those creatures are immune to toxic chemicals in milkweed sap, which developed in the sap to protect those plants from being eaten.  But with no harm to themselves, milkweed-dwelling insects collect that toxin in their bodies that make them taste bad to birds and other, potential, predators of insects, which is a form of defense.  Perhaps those same insects are orange and black to forewarn would-be predators that they are not edible and to leave them alone, which is another form of defense.
     The caterpillars of monarch butterflies ingest nothing but the thick leaves of milkweeds.  Female monarchs have to be botanists to lay their light-green eggs, one at a time, on milkweed leaves so their young will have food.  The larger, more noticeable, milkweed larvae are attractive with their yellow, black and white stripes crosswise over the tops of their bodies; colors that say "don't eat me".
     What is most interesting about monarch butterflies is the last generation of four generations of each year has the ability to migrate south across the North American continent to certain spots in Florida, California or Mexico to escape the northern winter, though they never were there before.  I don't think anyone knows how those monarchs know where to go to spend the winter.  Their southward flights in fall are another miracle of nature.
     The beautiful, one-inch-long milkweed tussock moth caterpillars appear furry with tufts of long "hair", which makes them look like a tiny dust mop.  Mostly black with even longer white hairs at both ends and orange tufts of "fur" on top, these are the larvae of a small moth with a wing span of one and a half inches, silvery-brown wings and yellow abdomens.  The caterpillars of this moth ingest nothing but milkweed foliage before they pupate.  Female moths of this kind have to be able to identify milkweeds from the many other types of plants in any one spot to assure food for their developing young.  The hair on the caterpillars' bodies also protects them from being consumed.  Most birds don't like to eat hairy caterpillars. 
     A pretty little insect, adult red milkweed beetles also eat the leaves of milkweeds, as do their larvae.  This is a half-inch, red beetle with black spots on heads, thoraxes and wing covers. 
     Two species of true bugs, large milkweed bugs and small eastern milkweed bugs are similar in appearance and habits.  The larger kind grows to be five-eight of an inch long while the smaller type can attain a half inch.  Both species as adult bugs are black with similar, orange-red markings that make them attractive to us, but warn away predators.  The wingless, larval forms are orange. 
     Both these related bugs, as youngsters and adults, feed on the developing and mature seeds of milkweeds in that plant's seed pods.  There are one or more generations of these bugs each year and the last generation of adults overwinters as adults.  The next summer, females lay eggs on the growing milkweed plants.
     Milkweeds have a final beauty during September and October, when leaves on deciduous trees turn bright colors.  Each milkweed seed pod dies, turns gray and splits open, revealing scores of brown, flat seeds overlapping each other like scales on a closed pine cone.  These, of course, are the seeds that survived the ravaging of milkweed bugs.  Eventually those seeds tumble out of their pods, each one with a white, silky parachute that carries its seedy cargo away on the wind.  Hundreds of milkweed seeds on the wind at once is a beautiful sight.    
     Look at milkweed plants more closely.  They have many inspiring beauties and intrigues that can make our lives more enjoyable.