Soft downy oval heads about the size of a quail's egg, on slender stems above a low grey-green clump. There are not many plants garden visitors want to stroke. This is one, and children cannot leave it alone.
It is a hardy annual from the Mediterranean, tidy at 30 to 45cm, flowering from July into autumn and drought-tolerant once away. It is also one of the best dried flowers we grow at Salle Moor Hall Farm. The heads keep their softness and their cream colour for years, and they hold up in a wreath better than most grasses.
Timing the cut is the whole skill. Leave it a fortnight too long and the head goes from fluffy to shedding, and once it starts dropping seed it does not stop; you end up with a bare stalk and a floor covered in fluff. Cut when the heads are plump and fully fluffed but before any seed loosens, and hang them somewhere warm and dark. The stems are on the short side, which limits it in a tall arrangement, so it works better in posies, wreaths and craft work than in a big vase.
