New milkweed plants coming up from seeds

[flgflowers]

I started my butterfly garden last summer and planted about 9 large milkweed plants. Now this spring I have about 500 seedlings coming up in about a 7 x 9 foot area. Should I thin some of the plants out or let all of them grow? I know I'm going to need alot of plants for the CATS.
I just thought overcrowding may tend to stunt all of the new plants. ( I already have about 20 lge seedlings in crocks.)

I know most of you have been butterfly gardening for years and have experienced this. What do you do?

[Keith Petrosky]

If they are all bunched together, i'm sure you will have Alot of caterpillars and monarchs visiting! The more plants you have, the harder it will be for the predators to find all of them, so I would say just let them grow, but next year i'm sure you will need to get rid of a few. If you decide to let them all grow, please take photos when they start to bloom, that would make a great photo!

[John Beaulieu]

Thanks to some seed swapping with a Monarch Watch member, I will have a dozen or so species of milkweed in my garden this summer. I will have them in areas so the species are separated. Has anyone had any experience growing different species in respect to cross pollination? The yard is fairly large (one acre), but I suppose some hybridization may occur as the birds and bees visit different species. My guess is that most pods collected may be true to species but a small percentage may be hybrids. Any comments appreciated.

John

[John Beaulieu]

My seedlings of Showy Milkweed are growing with very elongated leaves and this does not seem right, based on photos of adult mature Showy Milkweed. The seedlings are shown here...

The seed was from Bedrock Seeds in Alberta, and they claim that this is how they grow the first year, and will have more traditional leaves the next season. This may very well be true... But I wonder. Has any other MW member grown Showy from seed and observed this? Other species such as Poke, tuberosa, and Low that I also have growing have had leaves true to form.

John

[Keith Petrosky]

I'm sure your seedlings are fine.