Flower Seed Suggestions From Expert Gardeners WHERE have all the flowers gone? Seriously, where did they go? They're not in the garden, it would seem. The number of households growing flowers has dropped for three years straight, according to research from the National Gardening Association. It would be nice to think that we've torn up all our flower beds to raise black oxheart tomatoes and red warty thing squash. O.K., maybe not so nice. Apparently, at the same time flower purchases fell, food-garden spending climbed 20 percent. During a recession, we have discovered a surprising interest in feeding ourselves. And yet, even during hard times, the pompon bloom of a bachelor's button is still as cute as a lapdog's up-do. The brain celosia, with its magenta convolutions, looks as if it should be floating in a lab jar full of formaldehyde. And a sunflower still faces the sun. Which is another way of saying that, according to the data, there are 11.2 million households that have continued to buy flower seed. These folks know that seed catalogs are the place to find a palette of petal colors never seen on a paint chip. It's where you'll find flowers for every spot in the yard and every week of the summer. And at three bucks or so for 100 seeds, all this beauty is literally cheaper than dirt. The only problem with the variety of flower seed is that there's so much, it's hard to know what to choose. So we asked three experienced gardeners - from the Bronx, Los Angeles and Birmingham, Ala. - to recommend a few favorites for each region from the multitude of all creation. Flowers to look at and flowers to smell and (why not?) flowers to eat. One of our stalwarts even nominated a night bloom that can tempt the rarely seen sphinx moth. And what could be more exciting than lepidopterological epicureanism? We are confident that as soon as the public learns about this flower, seed sales will be headed back up. THE GARDEN Ms. Strazzera, 51, will start 250 different types of seeds this year as a gardener at Wave Hill, a pair of mansions and a public garden on the Hudson River in the Bronx. Notable occupants have included Theodore Roosevelt, Mark Twain and Arturo Toscanini. Wave Hill's 28-acre grounds encompass a conservatory, a flower garden, an herb garden, a wild garden, a water garden and "something called a monocot garden," Ms. Strazzera said. If you have to ask. ... NEW GROWTH "I'm going to try a different viola this year called Freckles," Ms. Strazzera said. Its formal name: Viola sororia Freckles. You could say the delicate, half-inch flowers look like purple dandruff on a clean white collar, or like a floral Rorschach test. Or, fine, like freckles. CAN'T GO WRONG A fugitive from the annual herb garden, borage (Borago officinalis, below) can go in the dirt as early as mid-February in New York. This flower tops the adorable-o-meter (not a real scientific instrument): the leaves and stems are furry, and the flowers look like tiny blue sea stars that have bowed at the waist. "Dip them in egg white and then superfine sugar," Ms. Strazzera said, to make candied flowers. RARE BEAUTY The common name of this less common plant is "throatwort" (Trachelium caeruleum). O.K., so it sounds like a social disease. But if you start the seeds in February, Ms. Strazzera said, this perennial herb from the Mediterranean will create beautiful lavender umbels all summer long. Purple bell vine (Rhodochiton atrosanguineum). Start this Mexican perennial vine indoors in February, move the pot next to a trellis in April or May, and then stand back. It "keeps going and going," Ms. Strazzera said, forming "beautiful, two-toned tubular bells" in mauve and purple. Nicotiana Babybella Ms. Strazzera likes to seed these dangling, maroon flowers next to ornamental vegetables like beets with their blood-red leaves. Sort of like a mix-and-match sweater set. Also called flowering tobacco, nicotiana "can be tall and really lanky," she said. This one is more compact - an endomorph, maybe. Pansy Padparadja Ms. Strazzera already has these cool-season blooms going in the greenhouse. By the Fourth of July, they'll be overheating like a malamute tethered to a street sign in Hell's Kitchen. Before then, though, these traffic-cone-orange flowers smell "sweet like violets," she said. Just delicious!