Blue Herons Bill

Common Name:

Native Crowfoot, Blue Crowfoot, Wild Geranium, Native Geranium, Storksbill, Blue Storksbill

General Description:

Hairy annual or biennial forb, with robust sprawling or ascending stems to 90 cm long, rising from a stout fleshy taproot.

Leaves with slender stalks, those at the base of the plant ovate, to 6 cm long and 3 cm wide, deeply dissected into 3 principal lobes which are again toothed or lobed, the stem-leaves smaller, opposite; stipules narrowed abruptly to a point. Flowers deep blue, with 5 obovate petals about 10 mm long and 5 mm wide, borne in umbels of 2 – 6 in the leaf axils, the individual flowers on stalks covered with long hairs.

Fruit a tapering beak, 4 – 7 cm long, splitting when ripe into 5 sharp-pointed fruitless ‘seeds’, each fruitlet about 6.5 mm long, covered with long white diagonally appressed hairs and surmounted by a spirally coiled awn bearing long bristles on the inner surface.

Flowering spring.

Occurrence:

Occurs on all soil types and in most plant communities; more prevalent on sandy soils