[dragonlady]

My mother bought some punnets of swan plants from Oderings (ChCh) yesterday, and we put my caterpillars on them until I could get some bigger plants – they were starving.
Today they are all dead or dying. I can only assume the plants had been sprayed even though the garden centre said they weren’t.
Is there any way to “clean” the plants?
At least I have some chrysalises and caterpillars hanging already.

[Jacqui]

BTW, the plants you bought should be planted out and covered so that eventually they will be safe for caterpillars – but don’t let the monarchs lay on them.

Here is some helpful information for you.

Plants

[Jacqui]

Dragonlady, sorry to hear about this.

Yes, please do as Caryl suggests and go back to Oderings. Find out WHO you speak to, please, and get in touch with me – jacqui@monarch.org.nz – so I can also follow this up on your behalf. Could you also let me know the information on the plant tags in the punnets as we (MBNZT) has good relationships with most growers and can also mention it to them.

We are gradually making growers and plant centres aware of just how distressing this is to monarch lovers and this sort of thing should be prevented in the future.

Look forward to hearing from you, but sorry to hear of this incident.

[Caryl]

Dragonlady, This is so sad and completely un-necessary. Please report this to the supplier today if you haven’t. Others will buy them and have the same thing happen. You are best to prevent caterpillars getting on to new plants. Give the plants 2 weeks to lose their toxicity. On Trade Me there are fabulous swan plants for $3 each in Christchurch. The seedlings will be too small for caterpillars to feed off and will kill the seedlings. I am in Wellington.

[Author]

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