Early fall color along Dunkard Creek at the Mason-Dixon Historical Park. Most notably, broadleaved goldenrod (Solidago flexicaulis), also known as zig-zag goldenrod, is now in bloom. This is one of my favorite wildflowers of any season - it grows in gorgeous clumps with brilliant gold flower spikes and broadly-ovate, sharply serrated foliage. It’s better behaved than most goldenrods and is ideal for a bright pop of autumn color in a native wildflower garden.

From top: broadleaved goldenrod, one of two species in this area with flowers growing from the leaf axils; blue wood aster (Symphyotrichum cordifolium), a common woodland aster that blooms right up to the first frost; garden phlox (Phlox paniculata), also known as tall phlox and fall phlox, a tall, wetlands-loving perennial that blooms from July through early October in Central Appalachia; sneezeweed (Helenium autumnale), which loves the marshy edges of ponds, lakes, and streams; short’s aster (Symphyotrichum shortii), a woodland aster with a special fondness for limestone bluffs.

Short's Aster (Symphyotrichum shortii (Lindl.) G.L. Nesom)

Asteraceae/Compositae (Aster/Composit Family) Base Flower Color: Yellow, Purple, BlueReproductive Phenology: Aug, Sept, OctBloom Notes: Flower centers (disc flowers) open yellow but turn dark red after pollination. For more information about this plant, Click Here.

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A few late summer odds and ends from a bike ride on the Mon River Trail yesterday. The asters are really starting to pop now as the days grow noticeably shorter and autumn closes in. A number of interesting vines are also in bloom and producing fruit for wildlife before the first frost. Climbing false buckwheat (Fallopia scandens) and oneseed bur cucumber (Sicyos angulatus), a member of the gourd family, are both aggressive twining vines with distinctive foliage, flowers, and fruits. 

From top: a goldenrod soldier beetle strikes nectar gold on a wingstem flower (Verbesina alternifolia); Short’s aster (Symphyotrichum shortii), a really beautiful perennial often found growing in dry to mesic oak-hickory woods with limestone near the surface; climbing false buckwheat, a delicate twiner whose pendulous fruit has three ruffled sides, like pantaloons; oneseed bur cucumber, whose bristly fruit can cause painful stings; crooked-stemmed aster (Symphyotrichum prenanthoides), also known as zag-zag aster, whose stems often zig-zag between the nodes of its spatula-shaped leaves; and the glorious New England aster (Symphyotrichum novae-angliae), one of the most important pollinator plants of late summer and early autumn.

Appalachia’s Autumn Bounty, Panel 1: Nature’s final push before the killing frost of October. 

The photos above are from an early fall stroll through Mason-Dixon Historical Park, which straddles the state line between West Virginia and Pennsylvania along Dunkard Creek and the historic Catawba War Path of the Six Nations. The park commemorates the farthest progression to the west of the Mason and Dixon Survey in the mid 1760′s. Hostile Shawnee and Delaware tribes put a stop to the survey at Brown’s Hill, where numerous stone markers denote the demarcation line between north and south. In addition to the artifacts of the area’s pre-Revolutionary War history and oil and gas industry, the park features a network of easy to moderately-strenuous trails traversing Brown’s Hill and Dunkard Creek, as well as a popular fairy trail.