Butterfly Milkweed Framed Print
Butterfly Milkweed Framed Print
Size & framing
12 × 18 in overall, in a 0.75 in wood frame (Black or Red Oak). The plate sits on an ivory sheet with a border of about an inch, like a matted print.
Printed on 189 g/m² enhanced matte paper, behind an acrylic front. Hanging hardware is included.
Prefer to frame it yourself? It also comes unframed.
Walcott's orange milkweed, painted life-size.
The print
- The full plate with its name, legend and credits, re-rendered from the source scan at print size, not enlarged from a shirt file.
- Restored from a library scan of the original book; nothing redrawn.
- Keep out of direct sunlight; dust the frame with a dry cloth.
Shipping & production
Each print is printed and framed for you after you order, usually within 2–5 business days, then shipped in its own box (separate from any shirts in the same order). Shipping is shown at checkout before you pay.
Returns
If your print or frame arrives damaged or misprinted, contact us within 30 days of delivery with a photo and we'll send a replacement or a refund. Because every print is made to order, we can't accept returns for a change of mind.
Plate 019
From the book
- Species
- Asclepias tuberosa
- As named in the book
- Butterfly Weed.
- Artist
- Mary Vaux Walcott
- Book
- North American Wild Flowers, vol. I, pl. 36, 1925
“The butterflyweed is probably our most beautiful orange-colored wild flower.”
Then and now
One of the milkweeds monarch caterpillars feed on.
Field notes
A milkweed whose sap isn't milky.
Mary Vaux Walcott painted it life-size for the Smithsonian in 1925 and wrote that it was "probably our most beautiful orange-colored wild flower," visited by hosts of butterflies.
She also noticed what sets it apart: "Curiously enough, however, its juice is not milky." Most milkweeds bleed white sap when broken; this one runs clear. Below ground it sends down a deep taproot, sometimes several feet, which is why it shrugs off drought and resents being moved.
It earns the name. Butterflies crowd its flat orange flower heads in summer, and monarchs lay eggs on it: like other milkweeds, it's a food plant for their caterpillars.