Autumn Joy Sedum and Asters Bring Add Fall Colors to the Flower Beds.

In the last blog, the ‘Autumn Joy’ Sedum was mentioned as the fall flowering plant now blooming in our garden.

Sedums are a large genus of flowering plants in the family Crassulaceae and are commonly called stonecrops.

There are many types of sedum available to gardeners. Some sedum are very low growing and are planted to creep and crawl along the ground or are planted in garden rock crevices so their leaves cascade over the rocks.

Low growing sedum varieties have different type of leaves and produce pink, yellow, or red flowers. Some of these low-growing sedums bloom in the early summer and provide a dramatic splash of color over a garden wall.

Autumn Joy is a larger sedum and can grow to a height of 24 inches. This large sedum is an autumn bloomer  with  blossoms, which start out light pink and then to a coppery red color.

Most sedum, including Autumn Joy, like moderately fertile and moist soils in a sunny location. However, should you have a dry sunny location, sedums can do well there also.   This tolerance to drier areas is the reason often Autumn Joy Sedum is  incorporated into commercial landscape sites.

In the fields of Ohio and the northeast United States, the asters are blooming. Asters have daisy like flowers and the wild asters growing in the fields, come in whites and shades of purples to almost light blue colors.

Rather than purchase asters for my garden, I have one section of a garden along the road that I allow the wild golden rod, white asters, and rudebeckias bloom in the fall after the day lilies have finished blooming.

If you prefer not to allow the wild asters to grow in your garden, aster cultivars can be purchased and come in an assortment of white, purple, lavender, pink or red flowers.

Asters do best in full sun in a moist well-drained soil.