It was extinct in Wisconsin and Indiana by the 1880s and nearly was extirpated from Iowa and Illinois before 1900. In 1978, only 18 sites were known to support the milkweed, and experts feared that it teetered on the brink of extinction. Because of continuing threats, Mead's milkweed was listed as a threatened species by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service in 1988. Mead's milkweed is one of 22 milkweed species known in Kansas. It is a slender, erect, perennial herb that grows to 2 feet tall, but it is easily overlooked amongst the prairie grasses.
Plants generally bear four to six pairs of lance-shaped, smooth leaves.
A single, nodding cluster of 10 to 20, greenish or cream-colored flowers is produced at the end of each flowering stem in late May or early June. Slender, erect pods mature from mid-June to October. The greatest concentration of Mead's milkweed populations is on tallgrass prairies in eastern Kansas and western Missouri, where plants often grow in shallow, rocky, well-drained soil on slopes and ridges. These conditions spared many such sites from the plow, and landowners use them instead for hay production or for livestock grazing. Most Kansas populations of Mead's milkweed are on prairie hay meadows.