GARDENERS' CHRONICLE 



OF AMERICA 



DEVOTED TO THE SCIENCE OF FLORICULTURE AND HORTICULTURE 



ADOPTED AS THE OFFICIAL ORGAN OF 



THE NATIONAL ASSOCIATION OF GARDENERS 



LIBRARY 

 80TANK L 



Vol. XVI. 



OCTOBER, 1913. 



Xo. 12. 



Hardy Asters 



By Richard Rothe. 



To stroll through the field and the woods on a bright 

 clear early fall day and return without a bunch of golden 

 rod and hardy asters betrays the dull eye and a unappre- 

 ciative mind. How beautiful the shades and colors 

 blend. Put in a vase in water we may enjoy this color 

 combination of free nature for a full week. Our vision 

 gains in subtlety, we become interested, desirous to study, 

 and study, in this case, confronts us with new garden 

 types and varieties of hardy asters. The rapid advance- 

 ment of American horticulture, a growing refinement 

 and a marked tendency to enliven garden and park with 

 successive floral arrays, bearing a characteristic stamp 

 of the season creates an ever present demand for ma- 

 terial. Hardy asters, or Michaelmas daisies, answer for 

 autumn displays. In the near future we will find the 

 Xovae Angliae and cordifolia class indispensable for our 

 purposes. 



Idardy asters, however, are not exclusively fall flower- 

 ing perennials. As soon as we begin to introduce the 

 rockery as a special feature of American home grounds, 

 the necessity arises to make ourselves acquainted with 

 the beautiful spring flowering Alpine asters. It seems 



to me the time draws nearer with every ensuing season 

 w'hen we will learn to appreciate those lowgrowing 

 harbingers of the vernal awakening. I wish to call at- 

 tention to Aster alpinus superbus, a valuable garden 

 type, eclipsing the original Aster alpinus. It bears its 

 masses of large single pale blue, yellow-centered flowers 

 on single stems, about 12 inches high, and appears at its 

 best during May and early June. Very handsome are 

 the new varieties Aster alpinus nixe, producing star- 

 shaped blossoms distinguished by long, narrow petals of 

 the same color as the former, and Aster alpinus ruber, 

 a claret shaded novelty. Being typical mountain plants, 

 and as such rock garden inhabitants, their usefulness 

 for edging the mixed herbaceous borders should not be 

 overlooked. The floral designer will find those asters 

 a very acceptable material for certain lines of his work. 

 The best of the springflowering class of asters for cut- 

 ting are doubtless Aster subcoeruleus and Aster Fre- 

 monti. Of stocky, robust growth they show a wonderful 

 freedom in the produce of large, handsomely shaped 

 flowers, borne on erect terns from 15 to 20 inches long. 

 Aster subcoeruleus should be grown in masses and used 



A FIELD OF H.-\RDY ..\STERS .M RIVERTON, X. J. 



