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Seeds of Asclepias syriaca (Common Milkweed) Milkweed latex contains about two percent latex, [clarification needed] and during World War II both Nazi Germany and the US attempted to use it as a source of natural rubber, although no record of large-scale success has been found. [41]
Asclepias syriaca, commonly called common milkweed, butterfly flower, silkweed, silky swallow-wort, and Virginia silkweed, is a species of flowering plant. [ 2 ] [ 3 ] It is native to southern Canada and much of the United States east of the Rocky Mountains, excluding the drier parts of the prairies. [ 4 ]
Balatá is a hard, rubber-like material derived from the dried latex of the Manilkara bidentata tree, primarily found in Guyana and the West Indies. The latex is harvested by making zigzag incisions in the tree's bark, [6] allowing the milky fluid to flow into collection cups. The latex is then coagulated in trays to form a durable substance.
The major commercial source of natural rubber latex is the Amazonian rubber tree (Hevea brasiliensis), [1] a member of the spurge family, Euphorbiaceae. Once native to Brazil, the species is now pan-tropical. This species is preferred because it grows well under cultivation.
You can easily spot the flower clusters (technically, umbellate cymes) in open meadows. Milkweed plants are a major food source for Monarch and Queen butterfly caterpillars and as with other milkweed plants, it bleeds white latex if a stem is cut and this sap is toxic to some animals and to humans.
This milkweed is native to the desert southwest of the United States and northern Mexico. It grows in dry slopes, mesas, plains and desert washes. [2] Researchers in Bard, California, tested the plant as a potential source of natural rubber in 1935. [3] Asclepias subulata is a larval host for the monarch butterfly. [4]