Look closely! Something magical is happening.

The milkweed plant goes unnoticed for much of the year, but come Fall, when the pods burst open and release their seeds, it is common to see the seeds floating in the breeze attached to a filmy floss. That's what I noticed on our afternoon walk when I captured this picture.

Monarch butterfly larvae (and some other insects) feed on milkweed leaves, so it is an important plant in the life cycle of the monarchs. Without milkweed, there wouldn't be monarch butterflies. Although the sticky white sap inside the milkweed contains a mild toxin, the monarch larvae, by feeding almost exclusively on the leaves, build up an immunity to the toxin, and this makes them distasteful to birds and other predators. Some surprising medicinal uses for milkweed over the years have been to suppress coughs and cure typhus fever and asthma, and to remove warts and cure dysentery. The tough, stringy fibers of the stem can be twisted into strong twine or rope or woven into coarse fabric. The fluffy white floss has been used to stuff mattresses and quilts and carried as tinder to start fires. And during World War II, it was used to stuff life jackets because it is about six times more buoyant than cork! Who knew this commonplace plant could be so valuable? And actually that's not all of the uses people (including modern-day scientists), have found for it, but it's certainly enough to qualify milkweed as a magical plant.

My intent today was to post a blip filled with vibrant, rich autumn colors, but then the milkweed caught my eye and changed my mind. I did get some wonderful fall pictures, however, and you can see them here if the colors of fall nurture your senses as they do mine.