{"id":225,"date":"2010-10-04T09:06:04","date_gmt":"2010-10-04T17:06:04","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/gardenersapprentice.com\/garden\/?p=225"},"modified":"2015-11-24T07:32:58","modified_gmt":"2015-11-24T15:32:58","slug":"thousands-of-stars","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/gardenersapprentice.com\/gardeningtips\/thousands-of-stars\/","title":{"rendered":"Thousands of Stars"},"content":{"rendered":"

THOUSANDS OF STARS
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\n\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 There are many reasons to grow garden asters.\u00a0 Butterflies of every description flock to them, as do the bees so essential for pollination.\u00a0 Asters are mostly carefree, giving you more time to thumb through bulb catalogs, pull the weeds that persist in coming up, and finish all the chores that you vowed to do last spring.
\n\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Plant taxonomists love asters so much that they have divided the genus into ten new genera, all of which sound vaguely disease-like.\u00a0 They are: Almutaster, Canadanthus, Doellingeria, Eucephalus, Eurybia, Ionactis, Oligoneuron, Oreostemma, Seriocarpus and Symphyotrichus.\u00a0 The most familiar types, formerly known as Aster novae-angliae and Aster novae belgiae–New England aster and New York aster respectively–are in the Symphyotrichus genus.\u00a0 Fortunately for all of us, 99 percent of retailers ignore the new designations and still use the word “aster”\u009d to denote these old favorites.\u00a0 Many gardeners are hoping that the taxonomists will eventually revert to older, simpler terminology, as they did with the common chrysanthemum.
\n\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 In my suburban travels I see asters increasingly used in the same way as “hardy”\u009d chrysanthemums.\u00a0 Showy plants with cushion-shaped flower arrays are sold in garden centers and big-box stores and purchased mostly for seasonal display in pots.\u00a0 There is nothing wrong with this practice, as it expands the range of fall offerings and brings attention to this appealing group of plants.\u00a0 I fear, however, that people will treat the asters the same way they treat those chrysanthemums, enjoying them while the color lasts and then throwing them away when the petals fall.\u00a0
\n\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 This is absolutely unnecessary.\u00a0 The flowers may be spent, but the plants are probably very healthy.\u00a0 If you get them in the ground within the next few weeks and water them regularly, they will most likely establish roots and return again next year. The yearlings probably won’t have the same tidy shape–though you can make that happen with enough care and attention–but they will have the same wonderful blue, pink, blue-purple and purple flowers.\u00a0 Eventually, if all goes well, your original plant will increase and possibly self-sow, giving you more asters at no additional cost.\u00a0
\n\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 When it comes to asters, I cling to old favorites, especially the beautiful Aster frikartii ‘Monch’, a Swiss-bred plant that blooms earlier than many other varieties; usually at the end of summer.\u00a0 Its blooms are medium blue-purple, with bright yellow centers.\u00a0 ‘Monch’ pairs nicely with just about any other plant.
\n\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 If you want something tall, pink and prolific, invest in ‘Alma Potschke’.\u00a0 The stalks are about 4 to 5 feet tall, but the plants respond well to being cut back by about one third in the late spring.\u00a0 This procedure, sometimes known as “the Chelsea chop,”\u009d because it occurs around the time of England’s Chelsea Flower Show, makes the plants more floriferous and less gangly.\u00a0 It also means that little or no staking will be necessary later on.\u00a0 I started with one ‘Alma’ and now I have at least 60 of them.\u00a0 Fortunately the seedlings are easy to spot and easy to pluck out of the soil in spring and early summer.\u00a0 Depending on where in your garden you locate your ‘Alma’ clumps, the blooms may be slightly different shades of pink.\u00a0 They last very well in indoor arrangements.\u00a0 I pair mine with the purple foliage of perilla mint and the combination is magical.
\n\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Breeders of perennials have made a major effort, especially in the last decade or so, to produce varieties that are compact enough to fit comfortably in containers or small garden spaces.\u00a0 For those applications, I am especially partial to the Woods series of Aster dumosus.\u00a0 The Woods series comes in light blue, pink, white and purple and are bred to be resistant to powdery mildew, the bane of asters raised in humid climates.
\n\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Shorter asters also pair well with more statuesque Japanese anemones, which should be a staple of every fall garden.\u00a0
\n\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 If you already have traditional tall asters, underplant them with something that will cover up their ugly “legs”\u009d.\u00a0 You can use shorter varieties of mums, or foliage plants like creeping euonymus.\u00a0 For a double aster whammy, underplant tall varieties with short varieties.\u00a0
\n\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 So don’t throw out those impulse asters, find a home for them in your garden.\u00a0 Next fall you will be glad you did so.
\n\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Asters are, of course, readily available in garden centers and other retail outlets.\u00a0 For a better selection, try ForestFarm, 990 Tetherow Road, Williams, OR 97544, (541) 846-7269, www.forestfarm.com<\/a>.\u00a0 The catalog is free to U.S. customers.<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

THOUSANDS OF STARS \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 There are many reasons to grow garden asters.\u00a0 Butterflies of every description flock to them, as do the bees so essential for pollination.\u00a0 Asters are mostly carefree, giving you more time to thumb through bulb catalogs, pull the weeds that persist in coming up, and finish all the chores that you … Read more<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-225","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-fall"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/gardenersapprentice.com\/gardeningtips\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/225","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/gardenersapprentice.com\/gardeningtips\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/gardenersapprentice.com\/gardeningtips\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gardenersapprentice.com\/gardeningtips\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gardenersapprentice.com\/gardeningtips\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=225"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/gardenersapprentice.com\/gardeningtips\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/225\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1565,"href":"https:\/\/gardenersapprentice.com\/gardeningtips\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/225\/revisions\/1565"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/gardenersapprentice.com\/gardeningtips\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=225"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gardenersapprentice.com\/gardeningtips\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=225"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gardenersapprentice.com\/gardeningtips\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=225"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}