Field Guide

The flowers of purple milkweed are pale purple to reddish purple to dark purple, with greenish or red tints. The scientific name means “becoming purple”: The flowers start off rather pale and become more intensely purplish as they mature.

When you consider the negative effects this plant has on natural habitats, and how hard it is to control or eradicate, you almost want to rename it “leafy scourge”! This invasive plant is spreading in our state. Learn how to identify it.

The flower clusters of green-flowered or spider milkweed bear large flowers for a milkweed. The jazzy purple hoods are dazzling against the greenish-yellow petals.

Mead's milkweed, an endangered wildflower, once flourished in the tallgrass prairies of the midwestern United States, including most of Missouri.

Conspicuous in early spring, wood spurge is a dainty species with loose clusters of small, light green flowers. Look for it in woods, valleys, streamsides, and waste areas in Ozark landscapes.

Whorled milkweed has rounded clusters of small white flowers. The leaves are soft, threadlike, and grow in whorls from the stem. It occurs in upland prairies and fields.

Prairie milkweed’s full, rounded clusters of small, delicately purple-tinged flowers set it apart from other prairie milkweeds.

Milkweeds are a group of plants that used to have their very own family. Now part of the dogbane family, they’re still a pretty distinctive group.