Sky-blue Aster (Symphyotrichum oolentangiense): blue Minnesota wildflowers

Sky-blue Aster

Plant Info
Also known as:	Azure Aster
Scientific name:	Symphyotrichum oolentangiense
Family:	Aster (Asteraceae)
Life cycle:	perennial
Origin:	native
Habitat:	sun to part shade; dry prairies, fields, edges of woods
Bloom season:	late summer, early fall
Plant height:	12 to 40 inches
USDA PLANTS database:	Minnesota county distribution map
Spotted in Ramsey County at:	Long Lake Regional Park Rice Creek Trail Corridor Vadnais/Snail Lake Regional Park

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Flower:: Flowers are ½ to ¾ inches across with 10 to 25 pale blue to violet petals (ray flowers) and a yellow center that turns reddish with age.
The bracts have diamond shaped tips and are pressed flat. One plant has from 20 to 100 flowers, sometimes more, that branch out in the upper part of the stem.
Leaves:: The leaves feel like fine sandpaper and are toothless or nearly so. Leaves near the base of the plant are shaped like long arrowheads, to 4 inches long and 1¾ inches wide that abruptly narrow at the base to become long “winged” leaf stems.
They quickly lose this shape as they ascend the stem and become much more narrow, and stemless.
Notes:: Identifying Asters can be really hard. The leaves and bracts are important in differentiating them. I first thought this plant was Arrow-leaved Aster, due to the shape of the lower leaves, but the leaves of that plant are decidedly toothed, whereas Sky-blue Aster is mostly toothless.