How would they differ in their response to the kind of climate there?

Pelargoniums are the South African variety, and as such are better suited to the climate in Spain, where as what is generally sold as a Geranium is a similar but distinctly different family.
They are both of the Geraniales order, but are different Genus.


I did write a bit about them in my gardening bits in the free beer bit.

The ones I usually see are the geraniums, rather than the pelargoniums.

if they are surviving in Spain they are pelargoniums.....

I wouldn't know a weed from a plant normally, but I got given a number of plants by a gardening neighbour who says they are Geraniums .... how can I tell the difference

Its as simple as this.

The geranium wont thrive in Spain.

Well, I found this.

http://geraniums.net/pelorger.html


<snip rule 7> the link is good enough.

Matt can probably define it better, but to me it appears that what we grow are pelagonia. What we call a geranium is in fact a zonal pelagonium.

Geranium is something else altogether.

.

Make it simpler!
Do they look different?

Depends how you define it.

The common 'geranium', you know the one you see growing en masse in council displays and windowboxes, are, technically zonal pelagonia. It's pretty different to the 'regal' pelagonium.

If you google Vernon's geranium it's a site that I have bought from. If you click on the bar at the left, it will have geraniums (zonals) and pelagoniums (regals etc) (pelagonia?) and each are further broken down into varieties/colours/etc.

That way you can see easily what the differences are.

thats what I said bill

More or less.

Not sure why I bother you know

Matt, I was trying to be pleasant. Tell you what, how about posting something on the differences between the geraniums and pelagoniums, and why that makes one more susceptible to the climate in Spain.

I'd be interested to know.