Bursting Out All Over...

Autumn is here..and bursting with flashes of yellow, orange and red...fireworks of milkweed seeds blowing in the wind.....wild berries and grapes.....And more to come...the colour is not finished yet...it will get better each day.

Today was a brilliant, sunny, warm day... the perfect time to check out the autumn colour and get some steps recorded onto my trusty little iPhone by walking one of the paths in a local conservation area. A no-jacket kind of day...Not too many of those left...best to take advantage.

One thing I was looking for was milkweed...I had just read an article about gathering milkweed seeds to plant in one's back yard to help save the monarch butterfly..and who would not want to do that? I have friends who do, but I have never tried. And of course, I found some! ( Milkweed that is, not friends) 

The conservation area is the perfect place to find milkweed - open fields, meadows with lots of golden rod and asters..and still some unopened pods for collection purposes...which I did not collect...I would have had to step off the path to get them..and the last time I did that I got bitten by fire ants..and besides, there are signs everywhere telling me to stay on the path!  

I am still unsure if planting the milkweed in my back yard is possible or advisable...it is invasive and I have enough invasion happening out there already! I understand there are varieties that are not invasive? More research is required...

But I just love to see that wonderful white fluff escaping the pods with the seeds in its clutches... setting them free at last, free at last.. free to venture forth and multiply! 

(Cue applause from Monarchs everywhere)