Eriogonums from Seed
Places to get seed :
From the wild
From your garden or a friends.
From Seed Exchanges of plant societies like NARGS (see the NARGS web page for membership info)
From Commercial Sources
Cleaning Eriogonum seed - (OR is there really seed in all that stuff? )
Maybe! The perianths of eriogonums are persistant and hide the hard little seeds. For the larger species with larger seed like E. umbellatum, Take a small handfull of seed and chaff in the palm of one hand then very firmly rub the heel of your other had into it. Rotate the upper heel bach and forth and you will reduce the dried chaff into powder which you can separate from the hard seeds. I haven't had the opportunity to clean seed of smaller species yet, but I have looked at some I have recieved and I assume the same procedure would work it would just be harder to do a separation of the seed and the pulverized chaff.
Sowing seed - Using the standard rock garden plant sowing procedure seems to work just fine. I.e. Nearly fill a pot with with you favorite gritty seed mix, slightly firm and level the surface, scatter the seed thinly on the surface, cover with a thin layer of grit or small gravel, then water genlty and place it outside in the winter cold for a month or two. In the spring you should get a good percentage of germination.
Potting up seedlings - If you use a very gritty soiless mix for the seed that will separate from the roots easily, spearating the 2 - 3 month old seedlings and potting them up individual in the same type of mix does not seem to present any problem with survival, just water them well and don't put them in direct sun for a week or two.
Plant out in Dry Sand Beds or other dry rock garden habitats and you have great little plants to enjoy for much less than if you buy them from a nursery.