Geranium Flowers

                Geranium is a genus of 422 species of flowering annual, biennial, and perennial plants that are commonly known as the cranesbills. They are found throughout the temperate regions of the world and the mountains of the tropics, but mostly in the eastern part of the Mediterranean region. The long, palmate cleft leaves are broadly circular in form. The flowers have five petals and are colored white, pink, purple or blue, often with distinctive veining. Geraniums will grow in any soil as long as it is not waterlogged. Propagation is by semiripe cuttings in summer, by seed, or by division in autumn or spring.

This consists of a beak-like column which springs open when ripe and casts the seeds some distance. The fruit capsule consists of five cells, each containing one seed, joined to a column produced from the center of the old flower. The common name cranesbill comes from the shape of the unsprung column, which in some species is long and looks like the bill of a crane. Many species in this genus do not have a long beak-like column. Geraniums are eaten by the larvae of some Lepidoptera species including brown-tail and mouse moth.