COMPOSITAE 



COMPOSITE FAMILY 



DRUMMOND'S ASTER 



Aster Drummondii Lindl. 



This is one of the blue Asters that grow in dry soil in wood- 

 land borders and on prairies from Ohio and Kentucky to Minne- 

 sota and Texas. The stem is usually stout, branched, 2-5 feet high 

 and densely covered with fine 

 whitish hairs. The leaves are 

 mostly thin and clothed with 

 hairs like the stem, especially 

 below. The lowest leaves are heart 

 shaped, sharply 

 toothed and with 

 slender naked pe- 

 tioles; higher ones 

 have margined or 

 winged petioles, 

 and leaves on the 

 branches are sessile and entire. 



The rather numerous heads 

 bloom from late x^ugust to Oc- 

 tober on racemose branches. The 

 linear and acute or acuminate 

 bracts of the top-shaped involucre 

 are somewhat hairy and their 

 green tips are not spreading. There are 8-15 blue ray flowers, and 

 the pappus is whitish. 



The Arrow-leaved Aster, Aster sagittifolius Wedemeyer, is very 

 similar to Drummond's Aster, the principal distinction being that 

 stem and leaves are essentially smooth. 



The Heart-leaved Aster, Aster cordifolius L., usually grows in 

 woods or thickets. The stem, 1-5 feet high, is smooth or nearly so 

 and much branched and bushy. The sharply toothed leaves are long 

 pointed, thin and rough and more or less covered with scattered hairs 

 above and on the veins beneath. The lower ones are broadly heart 

 shaped, slender petioled and 2-5 inches long; the upper are short peti- 

 oled or sessile and smaller. The heads are usually very numerous 

 and small but handsome. The bracts of the involucre are green tip- 

 ped but not spreading. The 10-20 ray flowers are violet, blue or 

 sometimes nearly white, and the pappus is whitish. This species 

 occurs from New Brunswick to Minnesota, south to Georgia and 

 Missouri, and blooms from September to December. 



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