Good Harbor Beach Common Milkweed
Last year was the beginning of our first and wonderfully successful Cape Ann Milkweed Project. My friend Joe Ciaramitaro from Good Morning Gloucester generously offered to hold the plant sale at Captain Joe and Sons, which is very conveniently located on East Main Street, and we had a fantastic turnout. This year I am thinking about doing things a little differently. Rather than shipping and handling live small plants, I am planning to purchase milkweed seeds in bulk. My question is, and this is not the official order form, but just to get a sense of participation, does anyone have an interest in planting milkweed from seed in their gardens, meadows, and/or abandoned areas around our community?
I think I can get good quantities of seed of Marsh Milkweed, Common Milkweed, and Prairie Milkweed. All three are very easy to grow from seed and take about 14 days to germinate. I will provide complete information and tips on growing milkweed from seed.
Please answer in the comment section if you are interested in growing milkweed from seed.
Why is it so important to plant milkweed for the Monarchs? I’ve written much about that and at the end of the post, please find a list of posts previously published about the importance of milkweed. In a nutshell, milkweed is the only caterpillar food plant of the Monarch Butterfly. The Monarch Butterfly migration is in serious peril One way we can all take action to is to plant milkweed to help mitigate the loss of habitat, partly due to global climate change and primarily due to the use of Monsanto’s GMO Roundup Ready corn, soybean, and sorghum seed along with the massive use of their herbicide Roundup.
News Release: MONARCH WATCH ANNOUNCES ‘BRING BACK THE MONARCHS’ CAMPAIGN
How Exactly is Monsanto’s Roundup Ravaging the Monarch Butterfly Population?
Yes I will sow seeds again!
Terrific Gwen. Tomorrow night I am posting the ordering information!
YES, I want to plant milkweed seeds. I am in very Northern CA
Hi Debbi, I’ll look into what is the best milkweed to plant in your region.
Thank you, Kim, for this important reminder to plant for the butterflies. I have happy memories of playing with milkweed pods and seeds as a child. It is a beautiful plant, and we definitely can make a positive difference for populations of all sorts, and especially butterflies, but planting host plants and nectar plants for them- and of course, refraining from using pesticides in our own gardens. I’ve never planted milkweed, but will watch for plants this year. If you end up selling some seed, I would be interested in purchasing some from you. A wonderful project! Thank you! Best wishes, WG
Thanks so much WG for your great input!! Tonight I am posting the order form.