Date: June 29, 2011. Location: Rochester cemetery(map)
| Classification Hierarchy | |
| Kingdom | Plantae |
| Clade | Tracheophytes |
| Clade | Angiosperms |
| Clade | Eudicots |
| Clade | Asterids |
| Clade | Gentianales |
| Family | Apocynaceae |
| Subfamily | Asclepiadoideae |
| Tribe | Asclepiadeae |
| Genus | Asclepias |
| Species | Asclepias purpurascens |
Date: June 29, 2011. Location: Rochester cemetery(map)
Scientific Name: Asclepias purpurascens named after the Greek god of healing - Asclepius. purpurascens=purple-ish
Common Name: Purple milkweed
Origin: Native
Notes: rare to infrequent in Iowa - dry to damp woods, thickets and openings also disturbed areas and sandy prairies along the edges of woodlands.
Additional references: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7.
Flowers: corolla and hoods red or purple, pedicels and peduncles densely tomentulose; inflorescence, 1 terminal or 2 or more umbels axial in the upper part of the plant; fruit, follicles erect, at tips of deflexed pedicel, canescent-tomentosem lance-ovoid, 10 to 15 cm long.
Leaves: opposite decussate, simple, elliptical or ovate-oblong contracted at base to a short petiole. margins entire. Sometimes the margins are wavy and fold up from the mid vein.
Glossaries of botanical terms: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7.
