I have found that the flowers of all the plants in the carrot family attract large numbers of insects including many types of wasps and hover flies, tiny beetles, etc. If you let the parsley and carrots flower in their second year they will be insect magnets too. In my yard the fennel, parsley, and goldenrod flowers attract the greatest number and variety of insects by far. It is fascinating to watch the swarm surrounding them when they are at their peak. If the swarm bothers you, but you still want the foliage for the caterpillars just cut off the flower stalks. The rue flowers are not as busy and it seems to be a last choice as far as black swallowtail eggs at least here. It is an attractive plant though and may get giant swallowtails to lay on it as well. Be careful when working with it though because it may cause some light sensitive skin blistering in people. I would make sure that the peat moss never dries out until the seedlings get a good start because once it dries out it is pretty hard to re-wet.

Oh good, it must not be too common a problem then possibly. I just let my BSTs go and never saw them again, so I wouldn't have a clue if they made more butterflies or not. Reading this I see it doesn't mention the plants, I thought it did, sorry about that guys. I will keep looking for the names of the 2 plants mentioned, I can still check this article cited, but I can't do it from this computer, will have to look into it tomorrow: The structure and development of the hairpencil glands in males of the queen butterfly, Danaus gilippus berenice Thomas E. Pliske, Miriam M. Salpeter.1971. Journal of Morphology. Volume 134, Issue 2 , Pages 215 - 241. I realize the names don't match, I will have to look into that too. The book is: Insect Biology, a textbook of entomology by Howard E. Evans, 1984 by Addison-Wesley publishing company. The paragraph I mentioned is on page 123 and says generally (I don't know if I'm allowed to quote it or not with copyrights)... Jerrold Meinwald and his team at Cornell identified 2 chemicals in the secretion of the hair pencils of the male Queen butterfly (which are hairlike processes the male wiggles over the female's head and antennae during courtship). The 2 chemicals Meinwald's team found are released during this wiggling and contain a ketone and a diol. During this, the mixture is brushed onto the antennae of the female. This chemical mix on the antennae causes the female to land and fold her wings, which would allow the male to mate with her. Pliske and Eisner found that males raised in cages on cuttings of the major food plant failed to mate successfully, but that males raised outside mostly on that same food plant intact, mated successfully. They then showed that males from cages had the diol but not the ketone, and the outdoor males had both. They found the outdoor males got the chemical precursor which allowed them to make the ketone came from another host plant upon which they spent very little time and only ate a little. They found further that the aphrodisiac was the ketone, and the diol only helped the chemical stick to the female's antennae.

Sandy, the leaf it's on now will probably be sufficient for about a week or so - it's practically impossible to get them off their original leaf no matter how bad looking it gets, so I don't even try any more. I'm amazed at how well they can grow when eating an old leaf! They always lay their eggs perfectly on the very end of the leaf. I saw a female laying eggs up close earlier this year, and I found out why - they perch in the general center of a leaf, then slide down 'til they reach the end. I saw this female slide, then go back and do it again, like maybe she overshot the leaf the first time. It takes about ?5 or 6 days for the eggs to hatch, a long time, since the eggs aren't very big - a good many RSP eggs must be infertile, because a lot of them just wither and disappear. Also, a good many RSP cats die in the first instar, regardless of whether you bring them in or leave them on the tree. They make up the difference by the huge numbers of eggs they lay. I can't remember exactly how long they stay on the "string" and the original leaf, but a week seems about right. Once I see the cat hanging over the branch (like a feline cat) just up from the leaf, I cut off the branch and bring the cat in to raise in one of my cages. I'm raising one cat now, and another one is in the "J" about to pupate. I'll guess they stay in the cat stage ?3 weeks. In the wild, they pupate in odd places, like I once found one on the outside garage wall by my husband's radio room door, and I found one on my street sign a few year ago! I once watched as a RSP cat pupated, and the ugly bumps they have on their backs are what change into the knob. Here's my famous road sign RSP chrysalid - Here's a picture of 3 RSP hatchlings on the same area of the same cherry tree - clickable thumbnail - And here's a clickable thumbnail picture of a RSP cat hanging over the edge of the branch, a good time to bring them in to raise - And here's a clickable thumbnail of a late instar RSP cat with a giant swallowtail caterpillar - the RSP is on the right - If your egg doesn't hatch, or the hatchling dies, don't blame yourself - this happens to a lot of them and you'll get more eggs! :) MissSherry

I hosted plant swaps for many years. I basically "made up" the rules for our Georgia GW forum plant swap as I think they started at my place. We trade two ways because we have GW to discuss trades. We have "pre-trading" online - say you don't have much of something, and someone else has something special too - you arrange a pre-swap trade and bring everything pre-swapped labeled with the swappers name. When the participants arrive to my home, each swapper is assigned a special "Spot" this is the spot they can use to put the things they are special trading for and can bring their new trades to. The first half our is meet/greet/load in and pre-swap trades. There was a "main swapping" area, largest area in the middle of all the action. This had stations that people could bring their plants to. All plants MUST be labeled with the common and botanical names (botanical names can be assigned that day, if someone didn't know them) and placed in an appropriate spot: perennials was divided in sun/shade, then annuals, veggies, herbs, a small area for fruits, houseplants and then finally: books, tools, ornaments and "other stuff" (perhaps someone wanted to bring their compost tea, or bags of compost etc)...and we had a table set up for seeds and also had a reference book out for labels if need be. After everyone arrived I would set up an area near the "exit" space with "free for alls" - everyone was encouraged to bring at least one plant for a newbie who had none. "Have nones" were able to contribute to the lunch or brunch though, so everybody contributed SOMETHING and nobody felt left out. The "have none" folks were welcome to take anything from the free area, and at the very end of the swap could take things that nobody else found homes for. Everyone was encouraged not to bring anything from the state Invasives & Exotics list unless they had done a pre-trade for it and educated their trading partner. The trade would start by everyone basically "lining up" and waiting for the "call" to begin. Everyone would then go take one plant and bring it back to their "spot" we'd wait until people were finished and then do it again twice more. After that people could just take what they wanted until they could take no more. We assumed that everyone had then gotten at least three plants and would be pleased. Once once did some ladies come, drop off stuff, grab a ton of things they wanted and haul out of their quickly. It was weird. The next year we communicated the rules "more clearly" and the reasoning behind the method (going slowly allowed time for people with physical disabilities, people who couldn't bend low, folks who needed help reading labels or have labels and plant habits explained to make their choices). As the hostess I mostly just participated in pre-trades although many people kindly brought me one of their "special" items to set aside because I was really too busy to trade. Then we all ate our meal together and had good fun, lastly was a tour of my garden if someone wanted it. Anyone who wanted to stay even longer could get a free "lesson" in something. Sometimes it was pruning, sometimes it was taking cuttings of things or seed saving. Whomever was deemed most educated gardener in that area would go ahead and instruct us all quickly in about 15 minutes. Everything lasted 3 hrs in general. Good times. I also went to local swaps for another gardening website. There we set up private areas and "car boots" and walked around with our plants offering trades for this and that. It always worked out so nicely. People often brought plants just to give away asking nothing at all in return. Perhaps they wanted you to try a new pepper they bred, or if this particularly hard to find tomato did well for you. Then we could discuss it through the growing season. Once I also went to a "nothing in return" trade at a private residence. The woman was dying of cancer and was a fantastic gardener. She had us all come to show us her beautiful garden and enjoy it with her: just a day of gardens and gardeners. Then she allowed people to take bits and pieces so that we would all remember a lovely lady and a lovely day. I still grow and save seed of the "mushroom pepper" she gave me that day.