Love-in-a-Mist

Love-in-a-mist is a dual-purpose cutting annual: the intricate blue, white or pink flowers sit inside a ruff of feathery bracts and are beautiful fresh, and the inflated, striped seed pods that follow are among the most ornamental of any annual, lasting for months dried. It grows 12 to 18 inches, and 'Miss Jekyll' and the 'Persian Jewels' mix are the standard strains.

Direct sow where it will grow, since it dislikes transplanting: as early in spring as the soil can be worked, because it germinates in cool soil, or in autumn in zone 6 and milder for an earlier, stronger crop. Barely cover the seed, thin to 6 to 9 inches, and give it full sun and ordinary soil that drains; it needs no feeding and little water. Sow again three weeks later to stretch the season, since each plant flowers for only a few weeks in early summer.

For fresh cutting, harvest when the flowers are fully open; for pods, leave them on the plant until fully inflated and turning papery, then cut and hang upside down in a warm, airy place. Bees work the flowers. It self-sows generously, and the volunteers that come up in fall and overwinter make the best plants. Deer leave it alone. Native to southern Europe and North Africa.