Erodium malacoides (L)L’Her. (L)L’Her.
Erodium malacoides is an annual herb with stems ascending to 60cm. Roots are fine, branching.
Leaves simple, ovate to ovate-lanceolate, cordate, dentate, rarely 3-lobed; basal leaves 0.5-5.5cm; stipules 2-10mm, triangular-ovate, membranaceous, whitish, glabrous.
Inflorescence: lateral umbels of 3-8 flowers; bracts 5-8, 1.5-5mm, free, or occasionally ± joined at the base, membranaceous, whitish, with glandular hairs on the outer face; sepals 2.5-5mm, with glandular and eglandular hairs on the outer face, mucro 0.2-0.7mm; petals 4.5-8.5mm, equal, ± emarginate, purple, with no blotch and lightly marked veins; nectaries green-brownish; staminodes white-pink, glabrous, stamen filaments gradually broadened at base, clear purple, glabrous; anthers purple; pollen yellow-orange. Flowers January to July.
Fruit: Beak 22-30mm; mericarp 3.5-5mm; foveole round, upward facing, glandular, with a wide shallow furrow beneath, also glandular; awn spiral of 6-8 turns with a few long bristles. 2n=40
Distribution: Mediterranean; roadsides, cultivated ground, waste ground, pastures, 0-1500m; Azores, Canary Is., Madeira, Portugal, Spain, Baleares, Malta, France, Corse, Sardegna, Italy, Slovenia, Croatia, Albania, Greece, Morocco, Algeria, Tunisia, Libya, Egypt, Israel, Jordan, Lebanon, Syria, Turkey, Transcaucasia, Azerbaijan, Ukraine
Remarks: this species is common and variable.
