As for caterpillars - my stuff was under aerial attack for a while -
little green caterpillars would drop out of my flowering cherry tree and
get onto the plants. They would eat an entire Darlingtonia flower in a
night. Or a whole pitcher plant leaf.
Rather than using nasty systemics, have you considered using BT? It is
very effective, and environmentally friendly, since each type is specific
to different types of insects.
Bob
>
> Does it make you feel any better saying I witnessed a similar incident on
> the weekend in my greenhouse? Not possums but catepillars of some moth
> that if I catch it will shortly become EXTINCT! ;)
>
> Why do they have to pick the best plants to chew on? I mean they
> picked the winning Cephalotus at last years ACPS show and totalled
> quite a few young developing pitchers and all I had left were half
> pitchers. Fortunately (for me) one of the blighters which was approx
> 1.5 inches long ended up inside a pitcher festering in its digestive
> juices. The other plant one of them got was my best Darlingtonia
> lovingly grown from seed, about 4 years old and finally producing
> adult pitchers. This plant had not a single pitcher left on it. It
> looked like the catepiller was using a lawnmower The rizome still
> looks O.K. so I hope it will reshoot. I hope they are still eating
> bits of my plants because there is now a chemical in the plant which
> may upset their stomachs just a little :)
>
>
> Cheers Terry
> bertozzi.terry@pi.sa.gov.au