Hummingbird and Butterfly Gardening: Happy Birthday Deb!, 1 by mellielong

mellielong wrote:
Well, I can't grow the asimina triloba down here because it's way too hot (they're good through zone 8), but my grandparents have a couple in their yard in West Virginia. Grandpa liked to eat the fruits. When I was up there last July I didn't see any caterpillars, but I wasn't as good as spotting them back then. Grandma said they had a late frost that seemed to slow the tree, too. They have several full grown trees by the way. For most of their range (pretty much from Georgia to Canada), asimina triloba is the only host plant for the Zebra Swallowtail. The shrubby asiminas are endemic to Florida (and I think parts of Southern Georgia). I'll have to ask grandma if she's seen any black and white butterflies or if she's noticed caterpillars eating her trees.

The butterflies will lay little green eggs almost exclusively on the new growth of the plant. You can pretty much check only the light green baby leaves to find eggs or little caterpillars. Once they get bigger they'll wander around looking for food and you can find them on the rest of the plant.

Ok, I doctored one of my pictures to demonstrate. The red circle is an almost full grown caterpillar, and the yellow circles are new growth where it is likely you would find eggs or tiny caterpillars.