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Fall flowers -- such as chicory, mullein, Queen Anne's lace and tansy -- have already been blooming for several weeks. On Sunday, while on a ride on the Armenia Mountain, we saw evening primroses and goldenrods; however, no asters.
We did check on the availability of blueberries on the mountain, and I'm sad to say that blueberries in our area are not going to be plentiful this year.
Mary Alice mentioned to me that the deer have been raising havoc with her flower gardens. Each year they eat the hollyhocks, lilies and cosmos. I suggested that she plant wildflowers, especially asters and goldenrods. They provide food and habitat for many birds and small animals that feast on the seeds and find shelter in the dried stalks.
Research done by the University of Delaware lists asters and goldenrods as the wildflowers that support the most species of butterflies and moths. Usually, deer avoid these two plants.
In the United States, we have 125 species of goldenrod and, in Pennsylvania, there are 32 native species, seven of which are on the endangered list.
Since the goldenrod and asters bloom when most pollen supplies are becoming scarce, the honeybees really work on the plants. These two plants are probably what enable the honeybees to put in their winter supply of food. Over a thousand different species of beetles, flies, butterflies and moths feed on the goldenrod plant.
An unknown author wrote:
"An ugly old woman walking in the woods was tired and footsore. She asked the trees for a walking stick to help her, but all the trees refused her request. However, an old broken stick said to her, 'I am old and ugly, but if I can help you, please use me.'
"As the old woman emerged from the woods, she turned into a lovely fairy, and turning to the stick, asked what it would like more than anything else in the world. Its answer was simply to be loved by children everywhere. After turning the stick into a lovely flower and sprinkling gold dust over it, the fairy declared that children all over the world would always love the golden rod."
Thomas Edison experimented with goldenrod to produce rubber, which the plant naturally contains. Edison created a fertilization and cultivation process to maximize the rubber content in each plant. His experiments produced a 12-foot plant that yielded as much as 12% rubber. The tires on the Model T given to him by his friend Henry Ford were made from goldenrod.
George Washington Carver was also deeply interested in the regenerative properties of soil and the potential of alternative crops, such as peanuts and soybeans, to produce plastics, paint, fuel and other products. Ford had long believed that the world would eventually need a substitute for gasoline and supported the production of ethanol as an alternative fuel.
By the time World War II began, Ford had made repeated journeys to Tuskegee to convince George Washington Carver to come to Dearborn and help him develop a synthetic rubber to help compensate for wartime rubber shortages. Carver arrived on July 19, 1942 to set up a laboratory in an old water works building in Dearborn. He and Ford experimented with different crops, including sweet potatoes and dandelions, eventually devising a way to make the rubber substitute from goldenrod, which was considered a weed by some.
Carver died in January 1943 and Ford died in April 1947, however the relationship between their two institutions continued to flourish.
Our common aster's scientific name is "Aster novac-angliac," belonging to the composite family. The common name of aster is Latin for star, referring to the flower's star-like shape. According to a Greek legend the aster was created out of star dust when Virgo looked down from heaven and wept.
The English call the European aster both aster and starwort. The star refers to the shape of the flower and wort originally meant root, which was applied to any plant with healing properties.
There are more than 75 species of asters in the United States. These species are hard to tell apart but all bloom from August through October when the first hard frost stops blooming.
Bill Bower is a retired Pennsylvania Game Commission Wildlife Officer. Read his blog and listen to his podcasts on the outdoors at www.onemaningreen.com.