Native Plant Gardening

boltonia asteroides


boltonia asteroides

by Particular-Bet-4336

1 Comment

  1. Particular-Bet-4336

    as a thank you to people posting about plants, i’ve decided to pitch in with a mini tribute to boltonia asteroides.

    i am a new homeowner working on my first garden.  wasn’t expecting much in this first year, however the boltonia asteroides i grew from seed absolutely exploded with blooms.

    not only that, it grew to about 4 feet and stands upright and bushy.  (i do have many of them planted together).

    i’m not sure whats going to happen next year, but this has been a joy and i think it would be nice as kind of a first season gratification plant for new gardeners.  i also found it easy to grow from seed.  it germinated faster and more reliably than most other seeds i grew.

    i am in 6a, former tallgrass black soil prairie.  this thing would probably do well anywhere in range if you give it full sun and some mulch.  it does like moisture but i barely watered it due to regular rains and a substantial layer of mulch around the plant.

    the flowers to me look celestial– and thats not some kind of a pun on asteroides (which means false aster).  there are so many blooms it looks like a cloud of stars.

    the foliage is kind of blue green and nothing got crispy or burnt out like you sometimes see on asters.

    now i will say, for a minute there, maybe late june or early july, my patch was looking a bit weedy.  some of it did flop in heavy wind and rain at this stage.

    but then they filled out and my patch kind of looks like a bush now.  absolutely zero chance of flopping over.  i would not say its the most elegant foliage, but it looks nice when it fills out and the wiry stems allow for those layers of blooms.  i am expecting it to be more full earlier in the season next year, but we will see.

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