SMOOTH-STE M ASTER 



in three or four rows, conspicuously green-tipped. 

 Pappus white. 



Often in open woods one comes tipon patches 

 of large, heart-shaped leaves, six to ten inches 

 long, and standing four to six inches high, and 

 one wonders what the plant that grows so gre- 

 gariously really is. By late August the question 

 is answered, for here and there amid the leaves 

 arises an erect, rigid stem, bearing a corymbose 

 cluster of pale lavender or white Asters, with 

 spread of flower about an inch. The rays vary 

 in size, and the efTect of the flower-head is ragged 

 and unkempt. 



SMOOTH-STEM ASTER 



Aster Id^is 



Native, perennial. A violet-blue Aster com- 

 mon in dry soil along roadsides and in open 

 woods. Maine to Ontario, southward to Georgia 

 and Missouri. August-October. 



Stem. — Rather stout, two to four feet high, branched 

 or simple, smooth, often glaucous. 



Leaves. — Thick-textured, pale green, sometimes glau- 

 cous, four to seven inches long, smaller as they 



8i 



