Erodium arborescens (Desf.)Willd.

Clade I; Subclade 1; Subgenus Erodium; Section Erodium

Perennial, subshrubby to 35cm, perennial stems woody, thick and contorted, about 12mm thick: tap root long with interrupted circular tubers.

Leaves in thick tufts on the green branch ends, entire, on long, stout petioles, outline triangular, round-dentate, about 60mm long and 50mm wide with deltoid or ovate acuminate, acute stipules 7mm long; stipules and bracts not much of a feature since the leaf bases are very close.

Erodium arborescens; S. Israel, Spring 2018; Photo credit: Ori Fragman-Sapir;  from the IGG Facebook Group, Licenced under Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 3.0 Unported (CC BY-NC 3.0)

Inflorescence: an upright sparsely leafy branching annual stem of umbels each of 3-5 actinomorphic flowers 3-4 cm across, rose red with a dark centre; umbel bracts large, brownish, oval, fine hairy. Flowers March to April. Pollen: eastern populations Geranium-type (El Oqlar), Tunisia and Egypt populations Erodium-type (Guitt.).

Erodium arborescens; S. Israel, Spring 2018; Photo credit: Ori Fragman-Sapir;  from the IGG Facebook Group, Licenced under Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 3.0 Unported (CC BY-NC 3.0)

Fruit: Mericarps have a very long feather, and a rather short coil; beaks 12-14cm.
2n=20 Guitt.

Distribution: Endemic to Africa – N. Arabia, Egypt to Tunisia, Israel: a xerophyte, found in hot deserts in rocky stony ground.

First published in Sp. Pl., ed. 4. 3: 638 (1800)

Synonyms:
Geranium arborescens Desf. in Fl. Atlant. 2: 110 (1798)
Erodium hussonii Boiss. in Diagn. Pl. Orient. 8: 119 (1849)