Milkweed Vine (Morrenia odorata) is a climbing milk-sap vine from South America. Also known as “strangler vine”, this species was cultivated in Pasco county in the late 1930’s and later reported as being found in an orange grove in 1957. In orange groves, this vine climbs the citrus trees and twines tightly around them. As the stem becomes woody it becomes hard and inflexible, effectively strangling the growing trees in an ever-tightening collar of vines. In Florida, Morrenia is consider to be an invasive exotic.
Milk Sap
Also known as “latex vine”, Morrenia is a genus of the Asclepiadaceae (Milkweed) family. When the stem is damaged or leaves of this vine are removed, the plant bleeds a milky sap that is high in natural latex. This milk sap is toxic to cattle and like all milkweeds, 
this vine should be removed from pasture and grazing land.
Anything Good About It?
Well, actually, yes. The flowers are pale green to white and are star shaped. The blooms smell sweet, somewhere between jasmine and vanilla. The vine bears a fruit that is apparently rather tasty and is edible to humans.
These fruits look a bit like chayote and can grow to about 5 or 6 inches in length. Additionally, the new leaves and shoots can be consumed as greens.
Here is some more information from wild food and edible plant forager expert Green Deane. First, he has an extensive post on his blog Eat the Weeds and also an episode of his Eat the Weeds video series which I have included below.
So, Why Is It At Your Butterfly Garden?
We recently discovered this species growing in a podocarpus hedge in front of our butterfly garden. After a very mild winter and the hedge not being regularly trimmed, I guess this vine finally managed to climb on top of the hedge where we could find it.
As Milkweed Vine is a member of the Asclepiadaceae family, that means it is edible to milkweed caterpillars. This means that members of the Danaus genus which includes our native Monarch and Queen butterflies can eat this plant as a host. I have read that both species will still prefer other milkweeds, but I plan to offer this as food in our lab reared populations to see what they think of it. We’ll let you know if they like it.
After reading Greene Deane's post, I'm sold... Where do I get seeds for this plant?
ReplyDeleteI have gonolobus growing, and while I have seen monarch caterpillars use it after they ate all of the leaves on the butterfly weed, they didn't seem to prefer it... The milkweed bugs, those bad boys are all about eating the gonolobus pods, butterfly weed pods, and any other kind of milkweed pods they can locate...