Wood asters, Home

There are lots of sure-fire signs that summer is beginning to give way to autumn, and one of the surest is the appearance, just about everywhere on my primary walking route, of the Wood Asters. These unassuming plants—OK, to gardeners, overly enthusiastic weeds—start making their presence known towards the end of August with pretty white-petaled blossoms that have yellow centers. The bees love them and, even though I wish the asters would avoid transgressing beyond the edges of the woods they generally call home, I rather love them, too. What I don't quite love is that, due to DNA analysis—darn DNA—taxonomists no longer consider the plants to be bona fide asters, which are, it turns out, almost entirely European. Our New World "asters" have now been broken into several genera, this familiar plant transferred to the genus Eurybia, a change that will further tax the few remaining neurons still functioning in this observer's brain.