Nice pictures, Sherry! He/she is absolutely beautiful. Zebras are my favorite butterfly. I've always loved red and black together. The red on the butterfly really sets it off. I also love the extra long tails on that kind of butterfly. Ever since I've seen pictures of it online and in my butterfly guides, I've wanted to get the Zebra Swallowtail here. As I said in another thread, several years ago I had ordered two paw paw trees online. I don't think they ever were alive from the time I got them. I had the same thing happen again with more that I ordered, so I gave up on buying them from people. I think small ones in pots would be okay, but I'm leery about the bareroot ones. I had also tried to start them from seed a few years ago, but I hadn't done my homework and didn't know that they needed shade the first couple of years. They came up and were a few inches high but then died. After I found out that they should have been in shade, I knew that's what killed them. A friend saw that someone had seeds for sale online last year and so I decided to give it another shot and planted some that I can plant out in the backyard. They're about half a foot tall, and they're getting planted next month. I've never seen a Zebra Swallowtail here or anywhere else as far as I know (unless I saw one before I got into butterflies and just didn't know what it was at the time). None have been reported for my county. I was told that they hang out around the river several counties away. If only I could make a trail of paw paw trees from there to here! I sure hope that I'll be able to attract them here sometime. We live fairly close to a creek, so I'm hoping that will help. Do you have a body of water right near where you are? I think you mentioned that you only have one or two paw paw trees, didn't you? You said you're going to try to raise them again. Do you have any type of strategy? I didn't know if you'd try a different method. I'm still baffled over why I have so many GSTs die when I feed them rue. The eggs get laid on those plants, so it's not like I switched them from one kind of host plant to another. I want to try raising them on wafer ash some year. Right now my couple of trees are in flower pots and are only a few inches high, so I think it will be quite some time before I can feed them wafer ash leaves. I even thought about moving them to a more open location instead of keeping them in small storage containers. If I had potted plants of rue, I could sit them in my butterfly cage and see if that makes a difference. Rue has a pungent odor, and so I was thinking maybe they can't stand that in a pretty tight space. I figure it's worth a try to raise them in a more open space. So I didn't know if you were going to try something different with your Zebras. I certainly hope that they do well this year for you. Cathy

It sounds like one of the schizura cats to me. I used to find unicorn cats/s. unicornis on my roses, but for the last two years I've found early instar schizura cats on my wild black cherries/prunus serotina. Here's a picture I just took of one of the early instar schizura cats on a cherry tree - And here's a picture of a late instar cat I took several years ago - There must be schizuras out west, Murray. Sherry

Way too much advice is being offered here. Make sure your Peace Lily is within several feet of a bright window, but away from direct rays of the sun. Do NOT disturb the roots. Watch carefully and water it just as the leaves start to wilt just a bit. It is okay for it to sit in a bit of water for a day or so. A little observation will soon tell you about how often it need water before it wilts. ~Will

Hi Caroline ... and all. I was surprised by your title ... up here, "PM" means "Prime Minister" (of our whole country, yet!). I thought, "Don't tell me that you have a Prime Minister ... counting eggs, too!". We're having a federal election coming up in October, so the major parties have been electioneering for some time. There have long been two major parties in our fair land, with another democratic socialist thrown in for good measure, who haven't traditionally had a major following ... ... and then, a few years ago, when a substantial part of the population in Quebec were talking about separating, they formed another party that sent some members to sit in our federal parliament. And then there are the Greens. This time, the somewhat untried son of a former prime minister is leading one of the major parties, but a union of the right wing side earlier resulted in their group forming a majority government a few years ago, and some fuss among them and a charismatic leader of the democratic socialists resulted in the democratic socialist party becoming the official opposition in the last parliament ... ... so now there's more or less a three-way race between the two traditional parties and the democratic socialists which has been the opposition recently. So ... I was wondering about a PM counting his eggs ... ... before they hatch? Come October., maybe? These guys can come up with Purple prose ... ... but if there are Martins among their crew ... ... I don't know their first names! ole joyfuelled ... who's unimpressed by political attack-ads: if ya ain't got somethin' worthwhile to say about your program - I don't care to listen to yer rant