Outdoor Visits  by Edith M. Patch

Flyaway Seeds

One fall day Nan said, "Don, shall we visit some plants with flyaway seeds?"

"Dandelions have flyaway seeds," said Don. "We played with some in the spring."

"They do not fly with wings as birds do," said Nan.

"No," said Don, "they go away where the wind takes them."

Nan said, "Uncle Tom told me that many plants have seeds that go up in the air like dandelion seeds."

"Perhaps," said Don, "we can find some to visit to-day."

Then Don and Nan went for a walk.

They found different kinds of plants with flyaway seeds.

They watched some of the seeds go away in the air.

When the wind went fast, the seeds went fast, too. Don and Nan ran but they could not catch the seeds.

"Each flyaway seed is a baby plant," said Nan. "It is going a long, long way from home."

"Perhaps it will come to a good place," said Don. "Perhaps the wind will stop and the seed will fall. Perhaps it will grow and live in a new home. Perhaps we can go to visit it then!"

Don and Nan liked the pretty flat milkweed seeds best of all the flyaway seeds.

The milkweed seeds were in a pod. There were many seeds in one big green pod.

Each milkweed seed had a brown coat. At one end of the coat were many fine white fibers.

The fibers were like soft hairs. They were as fine as the silk that a spider makes.

The milkweed pod opened when the seeds were ripe.

The sunshine and the dry air touched the seeds in the open pod. Then the fine fibers began to move.

The wind touched the soft fibers and they came out of the pod. The brown seed coats came with them.

A baby milkweed was inside each seed coat. So each baby milkweed had a ride.

The seeds went with the wind in the sunshine. They went high in the air when the wind took them up.

The wind went fast and took the milkweed seeds a long way.

The seeds fell to the ground when the air was still. They could grow in their new homes.

So there were many young milkweeds a long way from their mother plant.

Don broke a leaf from a milkweed stem. Some juice ran out of the broken place. The juice was white.

He and Nan told Uncle Tom about their visits to the milkweed.

Uncle Tom said, "Some people call the plant milkweed because its juice is as white as milk.

"But some people have a different name for the same plant. They call it silkweed because the fibers on the seeds look like silk."

"I shall call it milkweed because its juice is white," said Don.

"I shall call it silkweed because its fibers look like fine soft silk," said Nan.