Sticky stork's-bill is an annual monoecious herb which typically grows in rosettes pressed flat to the ground, with a deep tap root that allows it to survive through the summer on dry soils.

The stem is often very short, but can be up to 15 or even 25 cm long, green or reddish in colour, and covered in dense, glandular hairs particularly towards the top.

At the top of the basal segment there is a large, shallow pit that (unlike common stork's-bill) is not surrounded by a ridge and groove, but is partially covered by the long white hairs on the body of the mericarp.

The key features to look out for are the dense glandular hairs on the pedicels and sepals of E. lebelii, the greyish appearance of its leaves, the pale flowers which are usually in pairs, rather than groups, and the apical pit of the mericarp, which is not surrounded by a ridge and groove.

Musk stork's-bill is sometimes very glandular and sticky, but the leaflets of its pinnate leaves are almost entire, and it has large, pink flowers.

Although Jordan created an enormous herbarium, the type specimens are all British material, housed at the Natural History Museum in London.

Over the years there has been much confusion about which stork's-bills should be considered species, but the currently accepted account was worked out by Charlotte Henriette Andreas (1910–1989) in 1947, although she used the name E. glandulosum for E.

[11][6] The name of the genus, Erodium, is derived from the Ancient Greek word for a heron or egret, ἐρῳδιός (erodios), because of the shape of the fruits.

[7] Its conservation status globally has not been assessed,[13] but in Britain and France it is listed as LC (least concern),[14][1] although in Picardy, towards the northern edge of its range, it is classed as VU (vulnerable).