In Bloom in October

This article originally appeared in our October edition of Witch, What?, a newsletter for witches of all experience levels which you can pick up in person at our stores or receive for free with an online order. It includes information like that month's full moon, any Wheel of the Year holidays coming up, what is in bloom that month, and helpful articles like this one! These articles will not appear on our blog until the following month (or later), so if you want to get them right away, make sure to drop by our booth at the 400 Market!

The image used in the header for this post was photographed by Elizabeth Ballard for iNaturalist, and is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 4.0 International license.

Many asters are currently in bloom this month, including the New England Aster, which we cover in our zine Magical Flowers of Ontario.

For our newsletter, we have decided to cover the Frost Aster, so named because it is often seen after the first frost of the year has occurred. Also known as Symphyotrichum pilosum, it is not known to have many medicinal properties, but often related plants carry similar properties. So if you have no New England Aster but have some Frost Aster, go ahead and use that. This plant grows up to 120cm when healthy, and features many branching stems of small white flowers with yellow centres.

The Frost Aster is also akin to the opposite of the Crocus when it comes to magical energy, promising the oncoming snows of the winter season. It will be one of the last flowers you see this year, so you may wish to pluck and dry it to keep with you its strength and fortitude.