COMPOSITE FAMILY 



COMPOSITAE 



SMOOTH ASTER 



Aster laevis L. 



This very ornamental blue Aster is often cultivated in gardens. 

 It is common in dry open places from Maine to Saskatchewan 

 and south to Alabama, Louisiana and Colorado. 



The stem is usually stout, 

 smooth, more or less branched and 

 2-4 feet high. The leaves are thick 

 and either entire or toothed. The 

 upper ones are sessile and usually 

 clasp the stem, and the lower are 

 gradually narrowed into winged 

 petioles. Those of the branches are 

 often small and bractlike. 



The heads, blooming in Septem- 

 ber and October, are usually numer- 

 ous and about i inch broad. The 

 rigid, acute bracts of the bell- 

 shaped involucre are green tipped 

 and overlap in several series but are 

 not spreading. There are 15-30 blue 

 or violet rays. The pappus is 

 yellowish and the akenes are 

 smooth or nearly so. 



Short's Aster, Aster Shortii Lindl., 

 is a late-blooming blue species usually 

 found on wooded banks or along edges 

 of woods. The stem is rather slender 

 and spreading, nearly smooth and 

 2-4 feet high. The leaves are thick, 

 smooth above but minutely hairy 

 beneath, ovate or lanceolate and 

 tapering to a sharp point. They are 

 entire or only slightly toothed and all but the uppermost have slender 

 naked petioles. None of them are clasping but those of the branches 

 may be small and bractlike. The others are 2-6 inches long and 1-2 

 inches wide. The bracts of the involucre have green tips and are 

 not spreading. There are 10-15 narrow violet-blue ray flowers. 



The purple asters bloom in crowds 



in every shady nook, 

 And ladies' eardrops deck the banks 



of many a babbling brook. 



Autumn — E. G. Eastman 



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