A few notes about milkweed.

I live in central Illinois, so keep in mind that depending upon where you live, types of milkweed best suited for your area may be different than mine. I first planted milkweed four years ago, about the same amount of swamp milkweed and common milkweed. The first year, I got my monarch caterpillars from a supplier in Pennsylvania and they were shipped on swamp milkweed. That summer, most of the eggs I found were on swamp milkweed. The next year I ordered caterpillars from the same supplier, but most of the eggs I found later in the summer were on common milkweed. The last two years, I have not needed to purchase caterpillars because the habitat is established and attracts egg laying adult monarchs from the wild. In 2016 and 2017, almost 100% of the eggs I found were on common milkweed.

If you have never grown MW before, don't let the "weed" part of the name keep you from planting it. In the four years I have grown it, there has been no spread from the area. Even if a plant sprouts somewhere you do not want it, they are very easy to pull out and will not regrow from the same place.

Like any other plant, MW attracts insect pests and those pests will eat butterfly eggs and larva. Therefore, they must be dealt with, but of course NOT with any type of pesticide or other chemical. The two types of pests I see the most are small beetles and very small aphids. In both cases, they like to mate and nest at the very top of the plant. If you go out often enough, you can just brush them off.

Two things I have learned that make dealing with the pests much easier.

1. after a couple of years, your milkweed bed will become more crowded. The more MW in the same area the harder it is to control the pests. You are not going to harvest every egg, so just allowing one patch of milkweed to be a "safe zone" for beetles and aphids or whatever your plant pests are will allow you to keep your smaller, less dense patches almost pest free.

2. plant milkweed in pots and locate the pots in your flowerbeds. Because the egg laying adult monarchs are looking for flowers, having milkweed very close will give it a higher chance of being visited, and the fact that it is a lone MW in a pot will make it a much less likely target for pests.

I hope that members who have previous experience with milkweed and raising monarchs and who live in different regions of the country will post information specific to their areas.

My next post will present various options for containers for raising the eggs and/or larva.