Calico Aster (Aster lateriflorus)
- Family: Aster (Asteraceae)
- Flowering: August-November.
- Field Marks: This species differs from other white-flowered asters by having the midvein on the lower surface of the leaf hairy while the rest of the leaf is smooth.
- Habitat: Low woods, wet prairies, swamps, sloughs, edges of streams, borders of ponds and lakes.
- Habit: Perennial herb with slender rhizomes.
- Stems: Erect, slender, branched or unbranched, smooth or hairy, green or purple, up to 3 1/2 feet tall.
- Leaves: Alternate, simple, linear-lanceolate to elliptic, pointed at the tip, tapering to the base, with or without teeth, sometimes rough to the touch but not hairy on the upper surface, smooth on the lower surface except for the hairy midvein, up to 6 inches long, up to 1 1/2 inches wide.
- Flowers: Many crowded into a head, with many heads per plant, each head up to 3/4 inch across, composed of 2 kinds of flowers, the outer flowers white and ray-like, the inner yellow, tubular, forming a disk.
- Sepals: Absent.
- Petals: Some white, very narrow, ray-like, about 10-50 in number, others yellow, 5-parted, forming a short tube.
- Stamens: 5.
- Pistils: Ovary inferior, hairy.
- Fruits: Achenes elongated, hairy, light brown, about 1/10 inch long.
- Notes: The leaves are eaten by white-tailed deer, while the fruits are eaten by waterfowl.
Previous Species -- Rush Aster (Aster junciformis)
Return to Species List -- Group 8
Next Species -- New England Aster (Aster novae-angliae)
