Tom's Life Bits

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===== The beauty of 'October Skies' =====

//By Catherine Bollinger,// \\

{{hort:oct_skies.jpg|}}\\
//October Skies Aster is richly 
colored and aromatic.//\\
 
Even during last year's drought, my Aromatic Aster bloomed for six weeks. This year, it is already covered so densely with inch-wide flowers that you can barely see the foliage.

The botanists have changed the scientific name to Symphyotrichum oblongifolium 'October Skies,' but you'll still find it in plenty of catalogs as Aster oblongifolium 'October Skies.' The cultivar name is the key, aptly describing the color of the petals -- a deep blue-lavender that echoes the cloudless skies we relish in our region this time of year.

The catalogs call this aster low-growing. What it lacks in height (mine usually stay around 2 feet), it makes up for in spread. In my beds, its reach seems limited only by how far I'm willing to let it creep, but its spread is described as being between 1 and 3 feet.

It's called Aromatic Aster because of the spicy sweet fragrance of the leaves, reminding me of the old-fashioned chrysanthemums of childhood gardens. Not only do the leaves smell wonderful when crushed, but the oils in the leaves also protect the plants from deer predation. Even during last year's drought, when deer were eating anything green, this aster was unmolested.

Honeybees and other pollinators love this late bloomer too, making the spicy blue mound hum from dawn to dusk. I like to sit on my front deck on cool autumn afternoons listening to the soothing song of bees and inhaling the sweet spicy fragrance released by the lingering heat of the setting sun.

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