Last week we reached that annual mile marker where the length of the day is the same as that of the night. Known as the autumnal equinox, this is a moment so brief that we generally miss it. I think that everyone has noticed how short the days are becoming, but we still have a long way to go until the winter solstice. By then, the daily periods of sunshine will have been reduced by almost three additional hours. So, enjoy the sun while it lasts.
Down at my Thinking Chair this gradual loss of daylight is palpable. I no longer have to get out of bed at 4:30 a.m. in order to get down to the meadow before sunrise. Now, I can enjoy the luxury of sleeping until 6 a.m. and still make it to the chair in plenty of time to set myself up and get myself ready for the moment (now after 6:45 a.m.) when the sun decides to make an appearance. I do this in the hopes of catching tired migrants as soon as possible and over the years it has borne fruit. However, there is a price to be paid.
The shorter days are becoming progressively colder and colder. With this comes the increasing amount of dew on the grass, which results in wet feet by the time I walk from my house to the meadow. I also have to bring a cushion to sit on so the damp plastic chair doesn’t siphon off too much of my body heat. Soon I will have to start wearing gloves, and before too long I won’t be able to comfortably sit at the edge of the meadow any longer.
There is a wonderful reward for me in all of this. Quite randomly, one of my favorite wildflowers of all time had seeded itself directly in front of my field of view. I get to spend hours simply admiring the colors and details of the many flowers growing on this single plant. Furthermore, if I get up to stretch my legs, I can take a dozen steps to the east and find even more examples of this plant growing in a slightly different situation. The plant I am speaking of is the New England Aster (Aster novae-angliae).
If springtime is the season for the wildflowers of the forest, then autumn is clearly the season for wildflowers of the fields and meadows. Almost everywhere I look I can find one variety of aster or another. My beloved copy of Newcomb’s Wildflower Guide lists 43 different species of asters that can be found in Northeastern North America alone. All of them have flowers that are slightly varying shades of white, blue and purple and some of them can be diabolically difficult to tell apart from one another. Fortunately, this is not the case with the New England Aster.
Typically standing 3-4 feet tall, this species has gorgeous purple flowers that can be up to 2 inches in diameter. One of these “flowers” is actually a collection of numerous individual flowers that typically present themselves in two forms. At the center you find dozens of tiny individual blossoms that each have their own miniscule petals. This region is called the “capitulum” and the tiny flowers in the center are known as “disc flowers.”
Around the perimeter of the capitulum is a region of highly specialized individual flowers called “ray flowers.” Each of the slender petals that radiate outward is actually a single petal on a single tiny flower. The same architecture can be found in sunflowers. An interesting factoid is the fact that the Greek word “aster” actually means “star,” which is a reference to the starburst pattern of the flowers. Therefore, the Family “Asteraceae” is full of these composite, starburst blossoms.
One particularly interesting thing about the New England Aster is the fact that it can fold up its flowers for protection during the long, cool nights of autumn. When I am sitting and observing the events of the meadow in the early morning hours, the petals of the asters have furled themselves around the central disk. This makes sense because there are no pollinators out at night. Only when the flowers start to warm up will they unfurl and open the disc flowers to the bees and butterflies that search for nectar. An orange Monarch Butterfly on a purple and gold New England Aster is quite a lovely sight.
After several weeks, the flowers will start to diminish. The colors will fade, the petals of the ray flowers will whither and they will appear “dead.” But then the true nature of the flowers will show itself as the seeds are prepared for release. The flowers will turn into round globes of plant down that have a very soft and luxurious feel to them. Think of the seeds of a Dandelion flower and you will know exactly what I am describing. Dandelions, as it happens, are also members of the Asteraceae.
Finally, a reference to last week’s column about Nikonus and Iso. The quality of flower photos are purely Iso’s work. Gentle light to show saturated colors, and bright light to show the details of small structures. The background image in today’s composite photo shows the many flowers of the aster that is directly in front of my Thinking Chair. They have curled up to protect themselves, but the colors are still gorgeous. The inset photo was taken on exactly the same day when I took a walk to stretch my legs. Warmed by the direct sun the petals of these flowers have unfurled, and you can see that they are bejeweled with drops of dew. Nikonus was not so generous. Right above the inset photo, you see the tip of a dead branch sticking up above the vegetation. What you don’t see is the immature Swamp Sparrow that was sitting there a second before I snapped the photo. Drat!
Bill Danielson has been a professional writer and nature photographer for 29 years. He has worked for the National Park Service, the US Forest Service, the Nature Conservancy and the Massachusetts State Parks and he currently teaches high school biology and physics. For more information visit www.speakingofnature.com, Speaking of Nature on Facebook, or the Speaking of Nature Podcast.