Gotta love them Japanese

On the butterfly front, I am now down to only three black swallowtail caterpillars. On Friday, there were about fifteen. Imagine my surprise when I glanced over at my bronze fennel and saw it engulfed in caterpillars (I think the plant will survive but it's a near thing). The only other larval plant I have is a decent sized rue and I managed to coax and then actually pluck off and transfer bodily (some of those caterpillars were damned hardheaded) about five. I had hoped to make it out to the nursery to pick up some more fennel and maybe some dill, it's finally cool enough for dill and chervil and such. But, helas, I came down with a cold, not a bad one, but bad enough, and I've been curtailing much stuff. 

And arrgh, I have painting and mixed media classes to catch up with.

Arrgh. Maybe I'll feel up to painting tomorrow. Big Brother suggested mixing alizarin crimson and ultramarine for a better, richer, more nuanced black (okay, so he didn't say nuanced, so sue me). And I really want to try it.

Send good vibes to my butterflies, some of the big ones might have transferred to another plant to form their chrysalides, one can only hope. 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RVjru0N6IQg