Dzitmoidonc, I like the idea of chicken wire between poles. I'm looking forward to growing this vine! And that picture of a butterfly drying it's wings… I saw the exact same butterfly today, dead. Leafhead, I just realized I missed your question regarding Cassia. I have seeds for Candlestick (Cassia alata), Winter Cassia (Senna bicapsularis), Golden Shower/ chain Tree (Cassia fistula), Pink Shower/Pink Lady (Cassia javanica). Purple, remember I don't know any local gardeners personally. I've seen Butterfly Bush in St. Augustine, but it's part of their garden tour thing. I've seen it behind people's fences, and I wish I were a door-knocker plant-beggar, but I'm just not. They're not a pest as far as I can tell, they're just sorta scarce. Emailed regarding trade!

Solanaceae Family is the same as saying it is in the Nightshade Family. Brugmansia belongs to the Solanaceae/Nightshade Family. If something says "do not use on the Nightshade family" then I wouldn't use it on brugs. :)

Those huge green hornworms turn into the beautiful manduca sexta, or tobacco hornworm. East of the rockies we get the tobacco hornworms, and west of the rockies get the tomato hornworms. They look a lot alike, but have subtle variations. They turn into the beautiful sphinx hummingbird moths. These moths are valuable in that they are the only moths with a long enough probiscus (tongue) to pollinate many of the long tubular flowers in our gardens, like the daturas, brugs, nicotiana, etc. They don't usually appear in large enough numbers, and those that do appear, are often parasitized by wasps (if you see tiny white cocoons attached to the caterpillar, you might as well destroy them, because the wasps have already destroyed the internal organs of the cat) before they can metamorph into adults. I plant tomatoes just FOR the hornworms, as well as daturas, and other members of the nightshade family. Did you know tomatoes are in the nightshade or solanaceae family? A very toxic family? It also includes peppers, eggplant, petunias, nicotiana, browallia, cestrums, and a lot of other plants you commonly grow. Of course, many of the fruits on these plants are obviously edible, but many are not. The fruit and seeds of datura and brugmansia, for instance, are highly poisonous. Randy, who is rjj1 on this site, just grew some extra tomatos this year and removes the hornworms from the plants he wants to keep and puts them on his extra plants that he is growing for the hornworms. If you have children, you might want to try raising them so they can see the process. If you want to see photographs of the tobacco hornworm, here is a link (I don't know how to hyperlink it): http://entomology.unl.edu/k12/caterpillars/hornworm/hornwormpage.html Susan

What are the traits of Maxifort? Is it available in Australia? I've heard of people grafting eggplants onto wild tobacco (which grows as a weed here in Brisbane). I'd like to try this, but I don't want my tomatoes laced with nicotine. Would this happen or is it safe? I think I'm more looking for a list with "What is the most long lived plant in the Solanaceae family?" "What is the most tree-like plant in the Solanaceae family?" etc