Giant hyssop ‘Blue Fortune’

* Common name: Giant hyssop ‘Blue Fortune’      

* Botanical name: Agastache ‘Blue Fortune’

* What it is: A sun-loving, drought-tough, native perennial that produces fat wands of lavender-blue flowers from August until frost. The flowers attract bees, hummingbirds, and butterflies, but deer don’t like it.

‘Blue Fortune’ is a heavy-blooming variety of it that was good enough to earn a 2017 Gold Medal from the Pennsylvania Horticultural Society as deserving more use in mid-Atlantic landscapes.

* Size: Flowers poke up to nearly 3 feet tall. Space 2 feet apart.

* Where to use: Perennial borders, south- or west-facing house foundations, pollinator gardens, rock gardens, and any hot, sunny spot.

* Care: Giant hyssop needs well drained soil. Planting in wet clay often kills them over winter. Gritty soil and raised beds are ideal.

Fertilize in early spring with a granular, organic or long-acting flower fertilizer.

Snip off flower stalks as they brown to neaten the plants and encourage continuing bloom. Cut foliage to the ground after frost kills plants in fall or in early spring before new growth begins.

* Great partners: Most any pastel sun perennial pairs well, including salvia, coneflowers, catmint, Russian sage, dianthus, aster, tall garden phlox, and pink mums. Caryopteris is a good shrub partner that likes the same conditions and blooms blue around the same time. Pink spirea and pink shrub roses are other good shrub partners.