The following do well as a direct sow late winter here:
phacelia campanula (California Bluebells)
phacelia tanecetifolia (mauve flowers on lacy foliage) can be weedy,but easily pulled
---- this flowers early in June---if cut back it will give another flush of flowers in late summer
---- a real bee magnet
phacelia grandiflora ( flatter flowers on tall plants)

Because I have only a few seeds of these-they will be a WS:
phacelia sericea (native to Alberta Rockies) blue flowers
phacelia linearis (native Nevada mountains) blue to purple flowers
phacelia hasata (native Nevada mountains) pink flowers
phacelia bolandeiri (native to B.C.) blue/mauve flowers

I love Phacelia, especially the blue annuals - the colour just glows!
Phacelia sericea will be a good subject for the rock garden,where the drainage will keep it away from any winter wet, which seems to be a good idea even here in our dry climate. (Makes sense as its a montane/alpine species and a native of the Rockies to the west of here.) They tend to be fairly fussy to grow (as I've heard from people on other forums), and it was indeed very short-lived for me planted in regular soil (where it rotted off the next spring after blooming.)
My first attempt in the garden in regular soil (#1) and some pics of it (doing much better ) in the wild:




I was given a seedling of it last year and planted it in the tufa garden - it hasn't bloomed yet.

Thank you for the pics and info on the sericea variety.
Now I will treat it as an alpine.

Another variety, that I have a few seeds for, is the Phacelia bolandeiri, a B.C. and Alberta native plant.

awesome info.. thanks!!

After the seeds are WS and sprout etc., I'll update on the progress of the other varieties.

This is a large genus of plants---see the many varieties in the ATP database.
We need more pictures and information on all of these.

One thing----I was dissapointed by one packet of seeds this past summer.
It showed the phacelia visida on the front, but the plants turned out to be phacelia grandiflora.
I had those packets in previous years, and they gave the right plants.

Wow, I think I got P. campanula from a trade.
So it's best I wintersow it? Directly in the garden?
I don't want to fail.

They germinate best from the cold.
Here I would wintersow, or get them in the ground while we are still having freeze and thaw cycles.
You might try half the seeds as wintersowing, and the other half as direct sowing?

Yup. Usually I tend to divide seeds (if I got plenty) and seems like I have.
I'll give it a try.

Just a note to growitall:
It would be nice if you donated some pictures to the database on phacelias.

Anybody else have pictures?

Yes, I'll do that, Caroline.
Phacelia bolanderi is not actually native here... it's a plant of the Pacific NW, apparently:
http://www.google.ca/imgres?q=...
It's a beauty:
http://www.google.ca/search?cl...

It looks like we have 5 Phacelia species here, all native.... I'm only familiar with Phacelia sericea. Guess I need to keep a look out for some of these others when we go out hiking!

I got that from a USDA map---but maybe not accurate?
I'll be looking for more of these too.

Here's the distribution of Phacelia bolanderi from USDA Plants... native to the Pacific northwest and apparently not found in Alberta or even BC.
http://plants.usda.gov/java/na...

Thanks!
I also was told it was a B.C. native by the supplier?

Oh well, wonder which one they were thinking of, or which one you actually got.
Here are the Phacelia that occur in BC:
http://linnet.geog.ubc.ca/DB_Q...

We shall see in the spring---which one it is.

I just sowed some seeds of phacelia tanecetifolia - my first time to have these seeds. I'm looking forward to seeing them flower.

They are a soft mauve and different flower.
If they look weedy after the first flowering---you can cut them back, water them, and obtain a second flush of flowers.
Bees love them.