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Any plant of the genera Asclepias and Acerates, abounding in a milky juice, and having its seed attached to a long silky down; silkweed. The name is also applied to several other plants with a milky juice, as to several kinds of spurge.

Of, pertaining to, or resembling, plants of the Milkweed family.

A genus of plants including the milkweed, swallowwort, and some other species having medicinal properties. Asclepias butterfly (Zoöl.), a large, handsome, red and black butterfly (Danais Archippus), found in both hemispheres. It feeds on plants of the genus Asclepias.

Bearing a tuft of soft hairs or down, as the seeds of milkweed. Gray.

The bark of a South American vine (Gonolobus Condurango) of the Milkweed family. It has been supposed, but erroneously, to be a cure for cancer. [Written also condurango.]

several seeds and opens along the inner or ventral suture, as in the peony, larkspur and milkweed.

An incurved, tapering and pointed appendage found in the flowers of the milkweed (Asclepias).

Producing milk or a milklike juice or fluid, as the milkweed. See Latex.

A genus of plants of the Milkweed family, mostly woody climbers with fragrant flowers, several species of which furnish valuable fiber, and one species (Marsdenia tinctoria) affords indigo.

A very large red and black butterfly (Danais Plexippus); -- called also milkweed butterfly.

n into the pleural cavity. Pleurisy root. (Bot.) (a) The large tuberous root of a kind of milkweed (Asclepias tuberosa) which is used as a remedy for pleuritic and other diseases. (b) The plant itself, which has deep orange-colored flowers; -- called also butterfly weed.

A coherent mass of pollen, as in the milkweed and most orchids.

A kind of milkweed (Asclepias Curassavica) with red flowers. It is used in medicine.

as Silk gland, above. -- Virginia silk (Bot.), a climbing plant (Periploca Græca) of the Milkweed family, having a silky tuft on the seeds. It is native in Southern Europe.

plant of the genera Asclepias and Acerates whose seed vessels contain a long, silky down; milkweed.

An extensive and curious genus of African plants of the natural order Asclepiadaceæ (Milkweed family). They are succulent plants without leaves, frequently covered with dark tubercles giving them a very grotesque appearance. The odor of the blossoms is like that of carrion.

A poisonous plant (Vincetoxicum officinale) of the Milkweed family, at one time used in medicine; -- also called white swallowwort. African swallowwort, a plant of the genus Stapelia.

ower cluster in which the flower stalks radiate from a common point, as in the carrot and milkweed. It is simple or compound; in the latter case, each peduncle bears another little umbel, called umbellet, or umbellule.