Best planted in full sun but will grow in part sun at the sacrifice of flowers. Accepts water when given but this drought tolerant plant can be grown extremely dry and is tolerant of a wide range of soil types, including clay. In its dormant state it is hardy to winter temperatures below 0° F and useful in gardens in USDA Zones 6 through 10. This attractive plant provides food for monarch butterfly caterpillars and provides nectar for hummingbirds and nest building materials for other birds.

Asclepias fascicularis has a wide natural distribution eastern Washington, and Idaho west to Oregon and south through California and Nevada into Baja California and is generally more garden tolerant that other native milkweeds. The name for the genus was one that Carl Linnaeus ascribed after Asclepius (Asklepios), the Greek god of medicine and healing because of the many folk-medicinal uses for the milkweed plants. The specific epithet is from a Latin word 'fasciculus' meaning "bundles" in reference to the way the leaves are attached to the stem in bunches called fascicles. 

The information about Asclepias fascicularis that is displayed on this web page is based on research conducted in our nursery's horticultural library and from reliable online resources. We will also include observations made about this plant as it grows in our nursery gardens and other gardens that we have visited, as well how the crops have performed in containers in our nursery field. We also incorporate comments that we receive from others and welcome hearing from anyone with additional information, particularly if they share cultural information that aids others growing this plant.