Erodium gruinum

Leaves to 10 cm, ovate, almost entire, deeply lobed, often with a pair of free leaflets at base, lobes and leaflets irregularly toothed, dentate or serrate. Leaves often red mark along the veins.

Inflorescence: Umbels of 2-6 flowers, bracts lanceolate, acute, whitish; sepals 15-20 mm, usually with a few eglandular hairs; petals 20-25 mm, fugacious (petals drop by noon), blue to almost purple. Flowers Feb to June

Fruit: Rostrum 6-11 cm; mericarp of 12-14 mm; mericarp with numerous ascending whitish hairs, foveole has 1 or 2 deep furrows below, foveole surface minutely pitted. 2n=36

Distribution: Eastern Mediterranean; Crete and eastern Libya (Cyrenaica) to Iran and Iraq; dry grassland and maritime sands.