Coming Together to Discuss Current Botany Projects, Conservation, and Collaboration in Kentucky and Beyond
Missouri Ironweed (Vernonia missurica), West Kentucky WMA, McCracken Co., July 29, 2022
KNPS will be hosting our annual, virtual, Botanical Symposium on Thursday, January 26th, from 9AM-11:30PM EST. For several years, KNPS has organized a botanical symposium in the fall/winter with a goal of bringing together professionals, citizen scientists, academics, gardeners and students in order to learn about what’s going on in the world of Kentucky Botany. Everyone interested in the native plants of Kentucky is welcome to watch the Symposium and there is no charge for this event. The Symposium will be recorded and will be made available online if you are unable to attend.
We are currently working on lining up presenters and developing the topics for the Symposium. Watch The Lady Slipper for details as they become available. In the meantime, you might want to watch the presentations from the 2020 Botanical Symposium and the 2021 Botanical Symposium. If you have any questions, shoot us an email at KYPlants@knps.org
Save the Date! April 14th-16th, 2023at Cumberland Falls State Resort Park
Cumberland Falls. Photo: H. Braunreiter
Exciting news! Next year’s KNPS Wildflower Weekend date has been set for April 14th – 16th, 2023! For over 30 years, Kentucky Native Plant Society has partnered with Natural Bridge State Resort Park to offer guided hikes to explore Kentucky’s rich natural history and resources in the Red River Gorge. This coming year, Kentucky State Parks has offered to host our annual Wildflower Weekend at another of Kentucky’s beautiful state parks: Cumberland Falls State Resort Park. We are excited to hike new trails, see new wildflowers, and increase access to this event for members in a different part of the state. We hope you will join us and other nature lovers, families, community scientists, amateur naturalists, and professional botanists from across the Commonwealth, to explore the beauty and diversity of our native plants in April.
The event will include guided hikes through beautiful natural areas throughout the weekend, a Friday evening Friends & Members Social, and Saturday evening presentations.
The week prior to Wildflower Weekend, KNPS will be hosting our third annual week-long state-wide BotanyBlitz on iNaturalist from April 8th-15th. This week-long BotanyBlitz allows us to broaden our spring wildflower scope to the entire state of Kentucky and allows us to highlight natural areas across the commonwealth! If you work/volunteer at a natural area in Kentucky and would like to partner with us to host an iNaturalist hike at your site to kick off the BotanyBlitz week, please send an email to: WildflowerWeekend2023@knps.org
Also, if you would like to get involved and help plan this event, please contact: WildflowerWeekend2023@knps.org
To learn more information about Cumberland Falls SRP, click here.
Carolina spiderlily (Hymenocalis caroliniana) at Ballard WMA on 8/12/22.Photo courtesy of Pat Berla.
I hope this message finds you all well. As we move into late fall, Kentucky remains in drought conditions, with most of the state in moderate to severe drought. Down here in the Jackson Purchase we have had no significant rainfall since early July. As devastating as drought is to agriculture and gardens, the response of our native plants and plant communities to these conditions can be quite instructive. In low, moist, woodland communities, such as can be found in the Ohio River floodplains, the shady soils retained enough moisture, well into September, for most native species to continue to grow and bloom. On a visit to Ballard WMA in mid-August for example, we saw several native species in bloom, including the spectacular Carolina spiderlily (Hymenocalis caroliniana, syn. H. occcidentalis).
Join with other KNPS members and friends for our first, in-person fall meeting since 2019. Our 2022 Fall Meeting will be held at Blue Licks Battlefield State Resort Park on Saturday, October 15th. There will be a meeting in the morning, from 10am-noon, with interesting talks and updates from KNPS, and walks in the afternoon to look at some of the plants and plant communities that occur at the state park. The fall meeting will be held in tandem with the Short’s Goldenrod Festival being put on by the state park.
September 24 was a gorgeously mild fall day, perfect for Bluebirds of Central Kentucky‘s first festival. This organization’s mission is to improve habitat for one of Kentucky’s most beautiful native birds, the bluebird.
Our booth was next to Ironweed Nursery and Frankfort’s Fantasy Forest. The event took place at West Sixth Farm, also in Frankfort. Between the beautiful weather, the vendors, and the scenery, none of us could’ve asked for a better day, or time.
KNPS Director, Deborah White and Susan Harkins talked with lots of folks, but, mostly children. It was fun talking with children about native plants and habitat. Several were already knowledgeable on the subject, which was encouraging.
The Lady Slipper newsletter of the Kentucky Native Plant Society has been published since the Society’s founding in 1986. We occasionally feature an article from a past issue. This one, about Kentucky’s most widespread milkweed species, Common Milkweed (Asclepias syriaca), first appeared in the fall of 2011, Vol. 26, No. 3. If you would like to see other past issues, visit the Lady Slipper Archives, where all issues from Vol. 1, No. 1, February 1986 to Vol. 34, No. 1, Winter/Spring 2019 (after which we moved to this blog format) can be found.
Kentucky’s Common Milkweed (Asclepias syriaca L.) By David Taylor, US Forest Service
Whole plant with flowers
Common milkweed is a perennial forb that spreads by means of rhizomes and seed. It is one of about 115 species that occur in the Americas. Most species are tropical or arid land species. Plants may occur as a few individuals, but once established, form small to large colonies. Individual plants range from 1 to 2 m (~ 3 to 6 ft) tall. Leaves are elliptic to ovate to oblong and somewhat thick. Mature leaves are 15-20 cm (6-8 in) long and 5 to 9 cm (~ 2 to 3.6 in) wide, with a prominent midvein. The underside of the leaf is frequently finely pubescent. The stem is stout, usually simple, and green to black (see below) in color. When broken, the leaves, as well as stem and fruit, exude milky latex. Flowers are purplish to rosy pink to mostly white or even greenish and about 2 cm (0.75 in) long and 1 cm (0.4 in) wide. They occur in semi-spherical umbels (umbrella-like clusters) in the upper leaf axils. Flowers are somewhat complex in their structure, with structures not found in the average flower. The flowers are strongly and sweetly scented.
Milkweed pods
The fruits (pods), known as follicles, are formed from the union of multiple flowers. They are green, covered in soft spiky projections and are finely pubescent. When the seeds are mature, the follicle splits exposing the seeds. Each seed is equipped with a coma, a soft group of hairs. As the newly exposed seeds dry, the hairs of the coma expand allowing the seed to catch a ride on the wind. When broken, the leaves, as well as stem and fruit, exude milky latex.
Common milkweed is a widespread and somewhat weedy species. It is known from most of the eastern U.S and the eastern-most prairie states as well as southern Canada from New Brunswick to Saskatchewan. It is frequently found in fence rows, on roadsides, in fields, and in prairies and pastures. Given the opportunity, it will establish in gardens and even thin lawns. It is tolerant of light shade, but generally is a full sun species.
Monarch caterpillar on leaf
The genus name, Asclepias, commemorates Asklepios, the Greek god of medicine. Some of the species have a history of medicinal use including common milkweed (wart removal and lung diseases) and butterfly weed (aka pleurisy root— pleurisy and other lung disease). The specific epithet, syriaca, means ‘of Syria’ and is a misnomer: Linnaeus thought the species was native to Syria. This species is some times eaten as a salad herb, requiring multiple boilings of the young shoots before it is palatable. The reason for the boiling is to rid the shoots of various cardiac glucosides and other bitter principles. Milk weeds contain various levels of these compounds which render the plants toxic to most insects and animals. For some insects, the cardiac glucosides become a defense. They can store them in their tissue which renders them inedible or toxic to other animals. Monarch butterflies use this defense and birds leave them and the caterpillars alone. What the birds do not know is that northern monarchs feeding on common milkweed accumulate relatively little of the toxic compounds and probably would be edible. The more southern butterflies accumulate large amounts of the compounds from other species and are in fact toxic.
The stems contain a bast (inner ‘bark’) fiber used by Native Americans to produce twine and rope. The concentration and quality of the fiber make it potentially useful as a commercial fiber plant. Fiber quality is that of flax.
Common milkweed is an important pollinator and food plant for a large number of insects (more than 450 documented). It could be said that common milkweed is Nature’s mega food market for insects. Numerous butterflies, flies, bees, wasps, and beetles feed on the nectar and pollen produced by the flowers. Even hummingbirds will try, apparently unsuccessfully, to extract nectar. Aphids, especially the yellow-orange oleander or milkweed aphids (Aphis nerii), are commonly found on milkweeds including common milkweed. Large infestations of aphids can lead to formation of sooty mold on the plants which can turn the stems and leaves from green to gray to black. Two true bugs, the large milkweed bug (Oncopeltus fasciatus) and the small milkweed bug (Lygaeus kalmia) feed on the seeds, but the large milkweed bug is more often encountered. Large populations of either species can reduce the seed production potential of a colony of common milkweed by as much as 80-90%. The colorful (red with black dots) red milkweed beetle (Tetraopes tetraophthalmus) feeds on the leaves. The milkweed leaf beetle (Labidomera clivicollis), another orange-red and black beetle may feed on common milkweed but has a preference for swamp milkweed (A. incarnata). At least two caterpillars, the milkweed tussock caterpillar (Euchaetes egle) and the monarch butterfly (Danaus plexippus) feed on this plant. The red (or orange-red) and black coloration of most of these insects is known as aposematic coloration; that is, the colors advertise the fact that the organism is not good to eat. Other palatable species mimic the toxic species and gain some protection as a result. A well known example is the viceroy butterfly (Limenitis archippus) which mimics the monarch .
Large milkweed bugsPredated milkweed seedsMilkweed tussock moth caterpillarsMilkweed aphid, mothers and young, on Cynanchum laeve
For monarchs, common milkweed is among the most important food plants. It is the primary food plant for northern U.S. and southern Canada monarchs and is a major food plant for monarchs in the central and southern U.S. Monarchs migrating from the mountains of Mexico lay eggs on milkweed species in northern Mexico and the southern U.S. The butterflies that result from these eggs move further north in stages, with a change in species of milkweeds utilized as they move north. Common milkweed is the usual northern species. Monarchs can be helped by encouraging existing common patches of common milkweed and planting new ones. The plant grows readily from seed and spreads quickly by deep rhizomes. Because common milkweed can be weedy and difficult to remove, care should be used to establish the plant only in places where spread can be tolerated.
The Lady Slipper newsletter of the Kentucky Native Plant Society has been published since the Society’s founding in 1986. We occasionally feature an article from a past issue. This one, about the United States’ largest native fruit, the Pawpaw, Asimina triloba, first appeared in the fall of 2005, Vol. 20, No. 3. If you would like to see other past issues, visit the Lady Slipper Archives, where all issues from Vol. 1, No. 1, February 1986 to Vol. 34, No. 1, Winter/Spring 2019 (after which we moved to this blog format) can be found.
Kentucky’s ‘Tropical’ Fruit, the Papaw
by John Thieret, NKU
Photo: Ellwood J.Carr, from the collection of the Pine Mountain Settlement School
A visit to a fruit/ vegetable market in the tropics is a great experience. All sorts of plant products that we in the temperate zones do not recognize are there. Among these are fruits of the Annonaceae, the custard-apple family, including the bullock’s-heart, cherimoya, guanabana, sweetsop, and soursop. These are unknown to most people in our part of the world, but we do have a member of the Annonaceae that does NOT grow in the tropics, our papaw, Asimina triloba. This is a shrub or small tree, which, as I have seen it, never exceeds perhaps 20 feet in height and 6 inches in trunk diameter, although there are reports of individuals 50 feet tall and with a trunk 2 feet in diameter, truly a mega-papaw.
A common enough plant, the papaw thrives in rich woods over much of eastern U.S. from northern Florida to far eastern Texas, then north to New York, far southern Ontario, Michigan, Iowa, and southeastern Nebraska. It grows throughout Kentucky, almost certainly in every county.
Although some papaw enthusiasts wax ecstatic over the fruits, papaws are not everyone’s favorite. This divergence in appreciation stems from, first, natural differences in fruits from different trees and, second, differences in people’s taste buds. I have found fruits from some trees not worth the effort of trying to get them down from the branches. But other trees can produce fruits that I’d describe as almost excellent. The best papaws I ever tasted were in southern Illinois on a rather cool, almost frosty fall morning. Yes, quite worthwhile. The Indiana poet James Whitcomb Riley described, in hoosier dialect, the gustatory experience:
And sich pop-paws! Lumps a’ raw Gold and green,—jes’ oozy th’ough With ripe yaller—like you’ve saw Custard-pie with no crust to.
Another assessment of the taste, by an Indiana lad, is included in Euell Gibbons’ book Stalking the Wild Asparagus: “They taste like mixed bananers and pears, and feel like sweet pertaters in your mouth.” I’ll second that, at least for a good papaw.
Long before Europeans began their assault on the North American continent, the indigenous peoples, along with various animals—possums, raccoons, squirrels, and skunks—sought the fruit. The first Europeans to see it—some 450 years ago—were De Soto and his entourage. They wrote of it, mentioning its “very good smell and excellent taste.” About 200 years later the plant was introduced into cultivation by Europeans who brought seeds to England. Then in 1754 the first illustration of the papaw appeared in Catesby’s Natural History of Carolinas (see right). Lewis and Clark, in the early 19th century, found the fruits to be welcome additions to a meagre diet. To this day, the fruits are collected and used by country people and by city dwellers who like to eat their way through the landscape.
As for ways to use the fruits, first and foremost they can be eaten out of hand. As they ripen, they change from green to brown or nearly black, then looking not especially appetizing (recalling ripe plantains). The fruit pulp, creamy and sweet, contains several large, flattened, brown seeds. One of my friends made a necklace for his wife from the seeds. Better, I guess, than one made from finger bones.
Enthusiasts use the fruit for pies, puddings, marmalade, bread, beer, and brandy. I’ve tasted papaw bread and found it OK. Barely. I once tried to make papaw bread—I’ll say no more about that dismal experience. (The persimmon bread I attempted was no better.)
On a few occasions I have seen the plant grown as an ornamental. With its large, somewhat drooping leaves, it is rather attractive. The maroon flowers, which bloom in spring when the leaves are still young and covered with rusty down, are not all that conspicuous, and the fruits—well, my experience has been that papaw plants in cultivation as lawn specimens just do not make many fruits. As a matter of a fact, I have always noted that, even in the wild, the fruits are not abundantly produced. Maybe I just was not at the right place at the right time. The plants seem to require cross pollination, which is a disadvantage to those who would use them as ornamentals and, at the same time, would like some fruits.
If you have never tried one of the fruits, head for the woods in the autumn and attempt to find one. Maybe someone you know can help you. Even if you do not find the fruit much to your liking—maybe you will, maybe you won’t—you will have had a new gustatory experience.
For many years attempts have been made by horticulturists to ‘improve’ the papaw and make it into a commercially viable fruit. Their efforts notwithstanding, the fruit remains a Cinderella. On only one occasion have I seen papaws for sale: at a roadside farmer’s stand in southwestern Ohio among a fine display of squashes of a dozen kinds. Breeding and selection work has been carried out in several places, notably at Kentucky State University where about 1700 papaw trees grow in KSU’s 8-acre experimental farm and where the PawPaw Foundation is headquartered. Once, in Pennsylvania, I saw a papaw orchard of maybe 50 trees. I wish now that I had stopped and spoken with the orchard’s owner. Perhaps, with continued efforts at breeding and selection, papaws might some day be common items in our temperate fruit and vegetable markets, as common even as are the annonaceous cousins of Asimina triloba in markets of the tropics. This is the goal toward which papaw enthusiasts and breeders are striving.
