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.

I have black cohosh, but you do have some plants on your trade list I am interested in. Please check my page to see if you find any of interest. Thanks plantbug

Wait until the seeds mature -- there will be brownish small pod like structures about a month after flowering. Cut the seed stalks and place in a paper bag for a few days to dry. The seeds will fall off the stalks. Black cohosh is a "D" type germinator. Seeds need 90 days of warm, moist stratification, followed by 90 days of cold, moist stratification and then they will germinate when brought into the warm again. The easiest way to do this is to plant the seeds outdoors as soon as harvested and let Mother Nature do the work. It can take 2 years after planting for germination.

Only certain companies do ANY testing on herbal remedies. Its takes pharacuetical companies years to do drug testing, but there are no strict rules with herbal stuff. You really need to be careful what you buy. As far as the estrogen goes, what happened to your husband is a documented side effect of that hormone. Environmental estrogen is a real problem for some folks. I read about a chicken farm in the UK who used estrogen pellets to caponize the birds, and the grandfather and his little granddaughter developed breasts because they ate the chicken necks. The neck is where the pellet was inserted.