Did You Know............

...that Black Swallowtail butterflies like parsley?  I did not.  Maybe I had read that before but I didn't remember it.  I noticed that our parsley plant was being devoured and assumed that it was an animal that was getting to it, but nothing else that the deer liked around it was touched.  So I looked closer......

and found three of these caterpillars on what was left of the plant and had to look up what kind they were and learned a little about them.  They are Black Swallowtail caterpillars and they do like parsley, dill, and carrot tops and the related Queen Anne's lace.  They also, when touched, will emit an extremely sweet scent and their bright orange antennae will pop out to warn off predators. 

HWNSNBP helped me to film this with his tape measurer - the caterpillar was not harmed and kept on chomping away.   

Two of them disappeared the next day and if not for their bright coloration I would not have found them.  They crawled about 4 feet from the planter and crawled up the electrical cord for some outdoor lights and went into their chrysallis stage.  One of the chrysallis' was this dark color, the other was more green and closer to the ground and I couldn't get a good picture of it and didn't want to move the cord.  I kept checking them every day, but they disappeared over the weekend while we were away and I didn't get to see the butterflies that emerged.

Needless to say, there is nothing left of that one parsley plant except for the stalks.  Funny thing is that that plant was one that had overwintered in the pot.  We have a topiary lavendar tree in that pot with some other herbs planted around the base and we put it in the garage to keep it from freezing over the winter to try to save it.  The lavendar and parsley made it, the thyme and basil had to be replaced.  

I think I definitely be planting more parsley next summer and monitoring the plants closer and possibly setting up a butterfly hatchery to share with the grands.

Check out the other post from today below - they were supposed to be scheduled at different times but I goofed.