Hardy Mist Flower

Scientific Name: Eupatorium cœlestinum

Common Name: Hardy Mist Flower

Description: Late summer flowering, North American perennial; deep blue, mist-like flowers in late summer and autumn; attractive burgundy stems

Size: Plants grow to 3 feet high and 4-5 feet wide; spreads by underground runners

Cultural Information: Prefers full sun to light shade and moist, rich loam; pinch back in early summer for a bushier plant

USDA Zones: 3 through 9

Historical Notes: This handsome North American member of the aster family occurs naturally in low moist ground and savannahs, on moist wooded slopes, and along streams from New Jersey to Minnesota and in the West Indies. The species was listed in a British botanical magazine in 1730 and appeared in Philadelphia nurseryman John Bartram's broadside catalogue in 1793. Also known as Hardy Ageratum, this species resembles the cultivated annual Ageratum houstonianum, from Mexico. In 1851, New England garden writer Joseph Breck called it "the most beautiful" Eupatorium.^[1] Its late-season blooms attract bees and swallowtail butterflies.

- Peggy Cornett, n.d.

Further Sources

• Leighton, Ann. American Gardens in the Eighteenth Century. Amherst: University of Massachusetts Press, 1986.
• McMahon, Bernard. The American Gardener's Calendar, 1806. Charlottesville: Thomas Jefferson Memorial Foundation, 1997. See page 602.
• Thomas Jefferson Center for Historic Plants.