Milkweed in the Fall - November 2013

Milkweed is one of my favorite plants. The globes of the flowers smell very sweet in the spring - they are full of flying insects. In the summer, I check the leaves for Monarch butterfly eggs and caterpillars. And in the fall the seed pods burst open and the seeds float away with each breeze.

When the pods first begin to spilt, the tightly arranged seeds are visible inside.

And then the unfurling begins - slowly at first.

Sometimes the two halves of the pod stay tight and the brown seeds with their white fiber parachutes arch around the pod.

Once they are far enough out of the pod, each little breeze takes more of them away.

Eventually the pods are almost invisible in the mass of seeds and white fiber

And then the pods become empty - cleaned out,

And the seeds are wherever the wind took them.

Sometimes the white fiber stays with the seed and sometimes the seed detaches while the fluff continues on.