When Do You Plant Butterfly Weed Seeds?

Plant the spectacular orange butterfly weed in your garden.

Butterfly weed is also known as Asclepias tuberosa L., Orange Milkweed and Pleurisy Root. It is an ornamental orange flower with small blooms that is native to the United States. Butterfly weed appears bushy as it grows and is marked by "large, flat-topped clusters of bright-orange flowers," according to the University of Texas at Austin.

Seedpods

Butterfly weed seedpods will form in late summer and early fall, according to the University of Texas at Austin, so you will want to watch your flowers more closely during this time if you are planning on propagating new plants.

Gathering Seeds

Allow the butterfly weed to mature during the late summer and early fall season before collecting the seeds from the seedpods. You can grow new plants from the butterfly weed's seeds or from a cutting. If you pursue the former, you will be looking for long seedpods on the plant, which harbor hundreds of seeds.

Cutting Roots

In the fall season, you can cut the taproot of a butterfly weed plant into 2-inch sections, according to the University of Texas at Austin. Then plant each section vertically in moist soil.

Maintenance

It may take two or three years before your newly planted butterfly weed plant blooms full, bright orange clusters. As the plant grows over time -- it is a perennial -- the clusters will grow fuller and thicker.

References

• The University of Texas at Austin: Butterfly Weed