pronounced: jer-ray-nee-AY-see-eye
The name is derived from the Greek γερανος (geranos), a crane. Members of the family usually have blue, mauve, red, pink or white (not yellow) flowers with 5 petals. It is the fruits that give this family its name. In most cases, the fruit is a schizocarp with 5 one-seeded mericarps, each tapering from the apex to the base, and joined together in a circle with a beak-like stylar column in the centre. The fruit opens explosively when the seeds are ripe, and casts the mericarps away from the parent plant. Each mericarp takes a strip from the style to acquire a usually hygroscopically active awn, that twists into a corkscrew. The awns uncoil when wet, and contract when dry, and the pointed mericarp is thus driven into the ground, and secured with retrorse hairs (barbs).
