| All the species of eriogonum we grow are in Dry
Sand Beds. They get as dry a habitat as we can give them, here in Pennsylvania,
without putting a greenhouse over them. Some grow better than others, of
course, but several very desirable little ones are thriving and others
are blooming like crazy every spring.
I don't yet have pictures of all of them that are good enough to show,
but I hope to take them this spring and summer and add them to this page.
The ones that have bloomed here in our sand beds are marked with an asterisk
(*). Maybe more of the smaller species will bloom
this summer, which will help with keying them out to see if they are named
correctly. Almost all of them have been grown from seed. See the Seed
Source List for the places where I have gotten eriogonum seed and see
eriogonums from seed for
info on planting them. As of today April 6th, 1997 E. shockleyi, E.
umbellatum v. minor and E. umb. v. stellatum have germinated!
All pictures are Copright © by Brecknock Alpines, Mike & Jan
Slater and may not be used without permission.
|
Eriogonum
caespitosum - Tiny mounds of little
gray leaves, it is not quite as tight a bun as when we saw it growing in
Idaho last summer ( Flower close-up, whole
plant in the wild). They look healthy in the
sand bed but they haven't bloomed yet. Several plants
are showing small red buds today! (14-April-1997)
Eriogonum brevicaule v. laxifolium
* -  This
nice plant did pretty well, even through our rainy summer in 1996 (60.32
inches! 153 cm) but one of the two plants in the sand bed died this winter(1996-97),
three plants that I still have in pots look fine. This looks similar to
one plant we
found in Idaho last summer.
Eriogonum jamesii* -
Eriogonum jamesi v. flavescens
-
Eriogonum kennedyi v austromontanum
-
Eriogonum ovalifolium v. depressum
-
Eriogonum ovalifolium v. nivale *
- 
Eriogonum ovalifolium v. purpureum
* - Like
E. o. v. nivale but with flowering stems 6 - 8 inches long ( 15
- 20 cm).
Eriogonum panguicense v. alpestre
- nice small plants with
small gray leaves (even smaller than E. caespitosum) Several
plants are showing small red buds today! (14-April-1997)
Eriogonum sp. ex. Big
Horn Mountains of Wyoming*  -
(Probably a form of E. umbellatum) purchased from Siskiyou Rare
Plant Nursery, nice leaves form a mat less than one inch high with umbells
of creamy flowers on 6 to 8 in. stems.
Eriogonum strictum v. proliferum*
- nice greenish-gray leaves, which are not
parallel to the ground but almost at right angles to it. As if you held
out your hand not palm down, but with your thumb pointing down. Is this
an adaptation to reduce the effect of intense sunlight?
Eriogonum umbellatum*
- The common, archetypical, eriogonum, usually yellow flowered,
with yellow umbels. Easy to grow here in our sandbeds. I can spread to
form a mat several feet across in a few years. It send out short branches/runners
which form new rosettes of leaves as the plants slowly spreads.
Eriogonum umbellatum v. porteri
-a tiny version of E. umbellatum which forms congested
little mats.
Eriogonum wrightii v. subscaposum*
- Flowers are pink and arrayed alon the flowering
stem making it look sort of like a pipe cleaner. I don't think any lived
after blooming, but there are a few self-sown seedlings in the sand bed.
Is it monocarpic?
There are many good eriogonums we don't have yet but I keep trying seed
of many more each year. I find they germinated very well from seed. For
more info go to eriogonums from seed.
|
This
nice plant did pretty well, even through our rainy summer in 1996 (60.32
inches! 153 cm) but one of the two plants in the sand bed died this winter(1996-97),
three plants that I still have in pots look fine. This looks similar to
one plant we
found in Idaho last summer. 
-
(Probably a form of E. umbellatum) purchased from Siskiyou Rare
Plant Nursery, nice leaves form a mat less than one inch high with umbells
of creamy flowers on 6 to 8 in. stems.
