Aster Offers Carefree Groundcover

By Phran Novelli

PHILADELPHIA (CBS) - What do you plant in those places that get a lot of sun, where you'd also like to suppress weeds? One easy care groundcover is a low-growing native aster (Aster oblongifolius or Symphyotrichum oblongifolium).

All summer long you'll have a pretty green mound of tiny leaves that creates a thick cover like a very low shrub, blocking out light to the soil below so that very few weeds can germinate and sprout through. It's perfect for those hot spots near a sidewalk, driveway or around a mailbox where you want to have something pretty but not fuss about it too much. To keep the plant compact, you can cut it back once in June or so, and then just let it grow.

Now, in late summer and into autumn, these asters burst open and bloom for weeks with hundreds of bright purple or blue ray flowers that have sunny yellow centers.

They look like a fresh breath of spring on an autumn day. And these asters offer bees and butterflies a place to rest and refuel at a time of year when little else is blooming.