In article ,
says...
In Boron Elgar
wrote:

Last year I caught this swallowtail caterpillar devouring my dill.
Note carefully the tiny critter afflicting my destroyer. You can see
it about half way down the "spine".

http://i54.tinypic.com/2whnj1j.jpg

Still, this caterpillar was so beautiful it was difficult to hate it,
even though it took out a lot of dill.


We found one munching on one of our parsley plants a couple of years ago
and moved it to another less important plan in the garden.

But when I looked it up and read that the parsley was the only plant we
had that it would eat, we found it and put it back.

There was only one caterpillar and we had a lot of parsley.

We grow rue (ruta graveolens) for the swallowtails. It's a tough plant,
self sows readily, perennial in zone 5 and really does draw the
swallowtails. It's also reputed to give the swallowtails a bad taste.

The drawback is having to avoid skin contact with rue you because you
can get burns from it.