Amid the many SYCs of fall, a few fall flowering plants of different color are a welcome relief. Technically this aster flowers in late summer, the first two weeks of September over the past 5 years.
The pale blue aster, Aster laevis, is a tall (4-5 foot) plant with lots of 1 inch diameter flowering heads. The ray flowers are that type of blue that never seems right when photographed, and the disk flowers are yellow, which are still in bud on some of these heads and have flowered or are in flower on the others. They don't look very big but butterflies seem to love this plant, which is sort of a bonus. It does tend to reseed itself, so unwanted seedlings must be relocated or removed in the spring. As a tall thin plant a bit of support is necessary if not surrounded by other tall vegetation.
