Aster carolinianus
Aster carolinianus • Click here to visit our Main Plant List page for current availability of this plant
• common name: climbing aster
• flowering season: fall
• height: 6 to 8 feet, and even higher
• Light requirements: sun
• Soil requirements: average
• Water requirements: average
• Growth habit: needs support to grow tall such as against a trellis or growing through neighboring plants
• How to propagate: tip cuttings in early summer, or digging out a sideshoot from a mature plant
• Leaf type: 1 or 1½-inch long leaves
• Ways to use it: a long lived plant in the landscape, it takes a few years before it reaches a large size
• Special characteristics: the current year's growth does not die back to the ground as with Asters; this grows like a tall shrub, gaining in from year to year
Popularly known as the climbing aster, it has no clinging tendrils to help it grow upward, but weaves itself through other plants or through fencing and latticework. With your help tying the sideshoots up, it will grow taller more quickly. It's eventual height will be ten feet or more. The previous years growth does not die back to the ground in winter, so each year the new growth adds to its size. The leaves are small and the growth is not particularly dense, so it can happily mingle with other similarly size vines and shrubs. Our oldest plant is ten feet tall after about six or seven years growth. Being native to coastal areas of the southeastern U.S. into Florida, it needs hot summers to flower well. Its main season is October and November. In our cool climate we don't see any flowers some years. And occasionally instead of flowering in fall, the buds wait until the following spring to open! Each blossom is about an inch wide, in light pink. Large masses of them on a mature plant can be be very fragrant, something like flowering almond or marzipan, but we cannot detect any scent, there again, because of our cool climate. It is nicely evergreen, with the leaves taking on purple and red tints as winter arrives. Another name for it is, Ampelaster carolinianus. USDA Zones 7 - 10, possibly to Zone 6.