One of this season’s best performing plants is Nicotiana or flowering tobacco. Once planted in spring, a little supplemental water is all that is required. Here it grows pest-free.
It is an ornamental relative of N. tabacum that is grown for tobacco production. The lightly fragrant flowers bloom the second half of summer after seedlings are planted outdoors in spring.
The distinctive blooms of N. sylvestris or woodland tobacco top a three to five-foot plant with foliage that forms a backdrop for other smaller plants. The plant grows among other plants in a bed or container.
Nicotiana is an annual plant in this region but may re-seed a little the following year. Seeds may be dried and planted the next year.
As an herbal plant, browsing deer somewhat leave it alone. This season, deer in the area avoided treated plants but did eat them after rain removed the deer deterrent.
Other species of Nicotiana provide different colors and heights of plants that make it versatile in a bed with other flowers.
Maybe you’ll have a spot for this plant next season.
Thanks for your visit today. Do share a comment about the flowering tobacco with our readers if you wish.
Plant Exchange Blog 
It can naturalize, politely, without becoming invasive. I see it in some unkempt gardens in Santa Cruz.