The tree of the Autumn Equinox – 21^st September

Aspen trees are beautiful slender spreading trees with a shimmering foliage and a smooth pale bark. Heart-shaped wavy leaves dance with a rustling sound in the slightest breeze. The young leaves are coppery, becoming green and turning a vibrant yellow, sometimes red before falling in autumn.

Native to cool regions, the Aspen prefer open sunlight and moist well-drained soil, although they will tolerate a range of soil and climatic conditions that are not water-logged or hot dry soil. Water in a drought and occasionally mulch.

The Aspen is deciduous with separate male and female catkins flowering between February and April, on separate trees, ripening in May with white woolly seeds pollinated by wind although they often propagate by clone shoots in the root system. Helpful to wildlife especially the rare dark-bordered beauty moth.

Cultivation: Woods, heaths, gardens

Soil: Most well-drained, not water-logged or hot dry soil

Position: Sunlight, north, east facing

Foliage: Deciduous, copper to green to yellow in autumn

Flowering: Catkins

Fruiting: Woolly seeds in April/May

Habit: Slender, spreading

Hardiness: Fully hardy

Growth: Fast

Benefits to Wildlife: Yes

Height & Spread in Maturity: Approx. 18m x10m

History:

Some 12,000 years ago, as the Ice Age glaciers retreated, trees moved, some to colonise the British Isles.

Aspen currently are very scarce, this is partly because instead of using flowers, they tend to propagate by suckers underground. If left to themselves they will produce their own little baby aspens.

Symbolism:

The Aspen is sacred to Persephone, goddess of regeneration and the Underworld.

Our ancients believed that the wind was the messenger of the gods and the Aspen was considered Sacred as it’s acute hearing and whispering leaves responded to a divine calling.

The lesson: As the wind passes through the aspen leaves, they whisper a message of peace: Listen and find comfort in the voice of calm, the music of the spheres, in the voice of your god.

Planets – Pluto, Mercury, Saturn  

Stone – Black Opal

Polarity – Feminine

Deity – Persephone

Traits – Listening,  Overcoming Fear and Fearlessness – Shield – Light in the Darkness