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Geranium cinereum; photograph (c) Antoine Thivolle, some rights reserved (CC BY) CC BY(c) Antoine Thivolle, some rights reserved (CC BY) · observed growing wild · 2026-07-13

Geranium cinereum Cav.

Geraniaceae · France, Spain · listed by its genus as a temperate garden plant

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Geranium cinereum, photograph (c) Antoine Thivolle, some rights reserved (CC BY)Geranium cinereum, photograph (c) Antoine Thivolle, some rights reserved (CC BY)Geranium cinereum, photograph (c) Mikel Etxeberria Okariz, some rights reserved (CC BY)Geranium cinereum, photograph (c) Mikel Etxeberria Okariz, some rights reserved (CC BY)Geranium cinereum, photograph (c) Mikel Etxeberria Okariz, some rights reserved (CC BY)Geranium cinereum, photograph (c) Ana Garcia, some rights reserved (CC BY) 51 photographs ›
Habitat figures
Cold floor (1 night in 100)
-12.5°C
Record low -25.3 °C in 44 years, at a typical spot in the range NASA POWER
Warmest month, mean daily high
19°C
Jul at the habitat CHELSA
Rain a year (median across the range)
1,590mm
12 months of 25 mm or more in the median year CHELSA
Open-sky light
10–40DLI
Lowest to highest month (DLI) CHELSA
The year in your months, northern hemisphere
  1. Jan
  2. Feb
  3. Mar
  4. Apr
  5. May
  6. Jun
  7. Jul
  8. Aug
  9. Sep
  10. Oct
  11. Nov
  12. Dec
Rain spread: 70% of the median year's rain takes 8 months, so no short rainy season. rain rule, CHELSA
Northern hemisphere unless you set your site. The chart is in the habitat's months.

Summary

Geranium cinereum, the ashy cranesbill, is a species of flowering plant in the family Geraniaceae, native to the Pyrenees. Growing to 50 cm (20 in) tall and wide, it is a small, deciduous or semi-evergreen perennial usually grown for low ground cover, rockeries or underplanting larger subjects like roses. Leaves are deeply divided and grey-green – whence the Latin specific epithet cinereum "ash-grey". It flowers in summer, with striking black-eyed flowers with black stamens.

Quoted from Wikipedia, "Geranium cinereum", CC BY-SA 4.0.

About the genus · Geranium

Geranium is a genus of 422 species of annual, biennial, and perennial plants that are commonly known as geraniums, hardy geraniums, or cranesbills. They are found throughout the temperate regions of the world and the mountains of the tropics, with the greatest diversity in the eastern part of the Mediterranean region.

Quoted from Wikipedia, "Geranium", CC BY-SA 4.0.

Cultivation

Grouped as a temperate garden plant, listed under the genus Geranium in the archetype table, and Kew describes it as “perennial”, “temperate”.

Seasons

The rain rule reads no short rainy season: 70% of the median year's rain (1,162 mm of 1,568 mm) takes 8 months, September to January and March to May. Mean temperature moves 15.8 °C between the warmest and coldest month. Months are the habitat's, northern hemisphere; shifted six months for a southern-hemisphere collection: March to July and September to November.

Rain

1,568 mm in the median year at the habitat, 1,162 mm of it September to January and March to May. Wettest months (2 at 165 mm), driest month July at 95 mm. Across the grid cells of the range the year's total runs 1,025 mm to 2,031 mm, the 10th to 90th percentile of each cell's own year. The median of the cells' own yearly totals, 1,590 mm, is the year's rain at the top of the page; the 1,568 mm here is the median year's, the twelve monthly medians added, which the rain rule reads. Habitat calendar, northern hemisphere; median year across the grid cells of the range, CHELSA.

Light

Open sky over the habitat: 10 to 40 mol/m²/day across the year (daily light integral, median year across the grid cells of the range, CHELSA; the lowest 10th-percentile month across the cells is 7, the highest 90th-percentile month 43).

Warmth and air
Temperature

Coldest: the 1st-percentile night over 44 years at a typical spot in the range is -12.5 °C, the absolute minimum -25.3 °C, 7,815 frost nights in 44 years, 177.6 a year (NASA POWER daily minima). Warmest: the 99th-percentile day is 26.8 °C. Monthly means: the coldest month's mean nightly low -5.4 °C in January (across the grid cells of the range -9.9 °C to -0.6 °C), the warmest month's mean daily high 18.5 °C in July (median year across the grid cells of the range, CHELSA). Cold floor: -12.5 °C, which is the 1st-percentile night over 44 years at a typical spot in the range (NASA POWER).

Humidity

Relative humidity at the habitat: 59 to 63% across the year (monthly means, median year across the grid cells of the range, CHELSA). A figure about the air, saying nothing about how the plant takes water.

How this section is made

Each card states this species' habitat figures with their sources, and what two fixed rules read from them; nothing here says what the plant does, wants or tolerates. The rules · the terms.

Seasons. Read from the median year of CHELSA monthly rainfall and mean temperature across the grid cells of the range: the rain rule takes the smallest set of months carrying 70% of the rain and calls it winter when its mean is more than half a degree below the year's, summer when more than that above, and neither in between; the temperature rule, used only under 120 mm, names the cooler six months when they are at least a degree cooler than the other six. Months are shifted for the other hemisphere only where the temperature curve moves 4 °C or more and the habitat lies 10° or more from the equator. A reading of the curves, not an observation of the plant.

Rain. CHELSA monthly precipitation, median year across the grid cells of the range. The rain that falls where the species is recorded; nothing about how the plant takes water.

Light. CHELSA shortwave radiation at each envelope cell, a daily-mean flux taken to a daily total and converted at 2.07 mol of PAR per MJ. The sky over the habitat, measured; what reaches a plant under a rock, a shrub or a shade cloth is not.

Temperature. NASA POWER daily minima and maxima over 44 years at a typical spot in the range, lapse-corrected +843 m to its elevation; CHELSA monthly means, median year across the grid cells of the range. The cold floor is the 1st-percentile night named in its sentence. Not a measured survival limit for any plant in a pot.

Humidity. CHELSA relative humidity, median year across the grid cells of the range.

Group. Listed under the genus Geranium in the archetype table, and Kew describes it as “perennial”, “temperate”. A group is taken only where Kew's description of the species agrees with the table's listing. The table gives no figure and no prose; the cold floor is the habitat's alone.

Climate across the habitat

Habitat months, northern hemisphere

Habitat climate of Geranium cinereum through the yearWarmest month July, mean daily high 19 °C; coldest month January, mean nightly low -5.4 °C; 1,568 mm of rain in the median year (the twelve monthly medians added). Medians across the range, from CHELSA; the extremes at the edge from NASA POWER. Habitat months, northern hemisphere.-30°-20°-10°0°10°20°30°frost26.8° 99th-percentile day, NASA POWER-25.3° lowest night in 44 years, NASA POWER°C · day and nightcold quarter050100150200250mm rainDLI 10–40RH 59–63%JanFebMarAprMayJunJulAugSepOctNovDec
day night rain medians and 10th–90th percentile across 212 habitat cells, CHELSA cold quarter: the three months around the coldest month's mean nightly low extremes over 44 years at a typical spot in the range, from NASA POWER, marked at the edge, in no month DLI, mol/m²/dayRH %each on its own scale
Figures by month
JanFebMarAprMayJunJulAugSepOctNovDec
Day °C2 / -2–73 / -2–85 / 1–117 / 3–1311 / 8–1616 / 12–2119 / 15–2318 / 15–2315 / 12–2011 / 7–156 / 2–103 / -1–7
Night °C-5 / -10–-1-5 / -10–0-3 / -8–2-2 / -6–42 / -2–86 / 3–129 / 5–149 / 5–146 / 2–113 / -1–8-2 / -6–3-4 / -9–1
Rain mm136 / 85–19297 / 63–155113 / 67–157158 / 98–203153 / 109–183112 / 78–13395 / 68–111102 / 73–120123 / 89–150149 / 101–201165 / 102–228165 / 102–234
DLI12 / 9–1518 / 14–2126 / 23–3033 / 30–3536 / 34–3940 / 37–4340 / 38–4335 / 32–3828 / 25–3119 / 16–2213 / 10–1610 / 7–13
RH %60 / 56–6460 / 56–6360 / 58–6263 / 60–6462 / 60–6461 / 58–6459 / 56–6359 / 57–6360 / 59–6262 / 59–6461 / 58–6560 / 56–65
How this section is made
Each figure is the median across the 212 grid cells holding the 956 in-range records, with the 10th–90th percentile span across those cells after the slash where it differs. A dash is a month one or more of those cells has no figure for in the grid (a variable CHELSA does not carry there), so no median is taken rather than one over fewer cells. Extremes and elevation were read at a typical spot in the range, cell 942:3584 (42.875, -0.775). Over 44 years there: absolute minimum -25.3 °C, 1st-percentile night -12.5 °C, 99th-percentile day 26.8 °C. Normals: CHELSA V2.1 1981–2010 climatology, 0.05° cells (each the mean of ~36 1 km pixels). Across the range: median and 10th–90th percentile of each month across the 212 distinct grid cells holding 956 of the 956 in-range records; extremes and elevation at the typical cell 942:3584 (its coldest month's mean nightly low nearest the median across cells); its position is the cell centre. Extremes: NASA POWER (MERRA-2) daily 1981–2024, cell 43.00_-0.625, lapse-corrected +843 m at 6.5 °C/km. Elevation: ETOPO 2022, 1690 m (cell mean).

Natural habitat

Native range as published by WCVP; the marker is where the records are densest and decides nothing: the climate was read across the cells of the in-range records placed well enough to read one, not at the marker.
Openly licensed records inside the range, framed on where they fall.
NativeFrance, Spain · regions are the level-3 units of the World Geographical Scheme for Recording Plant Distributions, as Kew's World Checklist records ranges, some under historical names such as Yugoslavia or Czechoslovakia (how).
Map marker42.858, -0.084 · in the densest population, 949 records (95% of those in range)
Kew's description“perennial” · “temperate” · quoted from WCVP, RBG Kew (CC BY 4.0); not derived here
Evidence usedThe map marker rests on all 999 georeferenced records inside the native range; the climate across the range on the 956 of them placed to within 10 km; the map shows only the 690 openly licensed ones, which alone would put the marker 9 km away. 11 records outside the WCVP native range not used. 43 in-range records are placed to worse than 10 km, or with no stated accuracy (admitted only as a person's observation to three decimals), and stay on the map but off the climate.
How this section is made
The map marker: the openly licensed record nearest the middle of the densest 1° population of the 999 in-range records; it decides nothing. Records outside the native range, living specimens and records marked introduced are not used; which records count.

Photographs

Geranium cinereum, photograph 1did not loadGeranium cinereum, photograph 2did not loadGeranium cinereum, photograph 3did not loadGeranium cinereum, photograph 4did not loadGeranium cinereum, photograph 5did not loadGeranium cinereum, photograph 6did not load

Photographs: (c) Antoine Thivolle, some rights reserved (CC BY) (2); (c) Mikel Etxeberria Okariz, some rights reserved (CC BY) (3); (c) Ana Garcia, some rights reserved (CC BY).

Similar habitat climate The 6 nearest by mean daily high, mean nightly low and rain, month by month. How.

Ranunculus amplexicaulis Ranunculus amplexicaulis Amplexicaule Buttercup Photo: CC BY, CenaidaReseda glauca Reseda glauca Resedaceae Photo: CC BY, Flavien SaboureauValeriana apula Valeriana apula Caprifoliaceae Photo: CC BY, Flavien SaboureauVeronica ponae Veronica ponae Spiked Pyrenean Speedwell Photo: CC BY, frangpAntirrhinum sempervirens Antirrhinum sempervirens Plantaginaceae Photo: CC BY, Flavien SaboureauGeum pyrenaicum Geum pyrenaicum Rosaceae Photo: CC BY, Flavien Saboureau

Other Geranium 106 in the reference

Geranium albanum Geranium albanum Geraniaceae Photo: CC BY-SA, Tom RiggleGeranium albiflorum Geranium albiflorum Geraniaceae Photo: CC BY, Alexander DubyninGeranium alboroseum Geranium alboroseum Geraniaceae Photo: CC BY, Thomas GyselinckGeranium argenteum Geranium argenteum Geraniaceae Photo: CC BY, Elias Geranium aristatum Geraniaceae Geranium asphodeloides Geranium asphodeloides Geraniaceae Photo: CC BY, Milan ChytrýGeranium bicknellii Geranium bicknellii Bicknell's cranesbill Photo: CC BY, Patrick JacksonGeranium bohemicum Geranium bohemicum Geraniaceae Photo: CC BY, Tatyana SovaGeranium brevicaule Geranium brevicaule Alpine Crane's Bill Photo: CC BY, Felix CollinsGeranium caespitosum Geranium caespitosum Pineywoods geranium Photo: CC0, author not statedGeranium carolinianum Geranium carolinianum Carolina crane's-bill Photo: CC0, author not statedGeranium cataractarum Geranium cataractarum Geraniaceae Photo: CC BY, Rafael Medina all 107 ›

Names & registers

Also known as Geranium argenteum subsp. cinereum; Geranium cineraceum; Geranium cinereum subsp. cinereum; Geranium cinereum var. typicum; Geranium varium. (GBIF Backbone)

GBIFPOWOIPNIWFOWikidataWikipediaiNaturalist

The record

Family
Geraniaceae
Described by
Cav.
Native to
France, Spain
Wild records
999 in range · 690 open

Every figure here is derived from public data by a stated rule and names its source; nothing about this species is written for its page by a person or by AI, apart from the marked, credited quotations. How →

Where this page came from built 2026-10-22
GBIF species record gbif.species answeredasked 2026-10-22
GBIF synonyms gbif.synonyms answeredasked 2026-10-22
GBIF common names gbif.vernacular answeredasked 2026-10-22names fetched 2026-10-22
WCVP native range wcvp.distribution answeredas of 2026-06-04
GBIF occurrence records gbif.occurrences answeredas of 2026-10-21GBIF occurrence download https://doi.org/10.15468/dl.hbdw64, of 2026-10-21; 19 records within 1 km of a botanic garden, herbarium or zoo left out (4 at a botanic garden or arboretum, 15 at a zoo; Wikidata's list)
Habitat climate climate answeredasked 2026-10-22
Daily extremes (NASA POWER) climate.extremes answeredasked 2026-10-22NASA POWER (MERRA-2) daily 1981–2024, cell 43.00_-0.625, lapse-corrected +843 m at 6.5 °C/km
Wikidata wikidata answeredasked 2026-10-22
Wikipedia wikipedia answeredasked 2026-10-22
iNaturalist photographs, wild inat.photos.wild answeredasked 2026-10-22from iNaturalist's open data of 2026-09-27: research-grade observations with an open-licence photograph, the 24 whose photographs iNaturalist received last (the open data holds no votes); filled 2026-10-22
iNaturalist photographs, cultivated inat.photos.cultivated not asked
GBIF media gbif.media answeredasked 2026-10-22
OpenAlex papers openalex not askednot yet asked for this reference; a later fill takes the papers from OpenAlex's snapshot

Every source is recorded as having answered, reported nothing, refused, failed, not been asked, or answered twice where one answer is taken (“not taken: two items answered”), and, for a source asked when this page was built, when: the figures are as the source held them that day; a source read from a file (Kew's World Checklist, a GBIF download) says "as of" the file's day instead; a row carried from an earlier build of the page names that build instead. Only “nothing to report” is ever shown as an absence. Records came from 67 datasets via GBIF.org; each carries its own licence.

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