Asters, known in the UK as Michaelmas daisies, bring vibrant colour to gardens and parks as summer changes to autumn. They help to provide some of the valuable pollen and nectar sought by the last of the flying, foraging and fluttering insects as they desperately seek food before the weather becomes too cold.
I love the brilliant magenta colour of this one flowering in our garden at the moment. It shines in the sun, glows in the autumn mist and even manages to twinkle in the rain. Autumn would not be so bonny without them.
My Country File Calendar announces that Autumn starts on 22nd September this year. That’s when there’ll be 12 hours of daylight and 12 hours of darkness, the autumn equinox in other words.
A few days later, on 29th September, it will be the Feast of Michael and all Angels and this is a constant date in the church calendar when St Michael, principal angelic warrior and our protector against the dark and the night is celebrated.
Michaelmas was one of the four mediaeval “quarter days” when rents were due, servants were hired and leases begun. The others are Lady Day in the Spring, Midsummer and Christmas, all close to an equinox or a solstice. Traditionally, harvest was supposed to be completed by Michaelmas so we’d better get out there. It probably just referred to the grain crops though because there’s still a lot to be got off the trees and out of the ground.
St Michael was the principal Archangel who is said to have defeated Satan and, according to English folklore, threw him out of Heaven so that he landed in a blackberry bush. Lucifer cursed and stamped on this innocent shrub and scorched its fruits with his fiery breath making them inedible from this date on.
So there we have it – Good was triumphant over Evil. Unfortunately that’s only in Heaven.
It’s proving a lot more difficult to achieve on Earth!
