Gray-Green Woodsorrel
Gray-Green Woodsorrel, Slender Yellow Woodsorrel, Sheep Sorrel, Sheep Showers
Oxalis dillenii Jacq., Oxalis stricta L.
Oxalidaceae (Woodsorrel Family)
▲ young plant
▲ plant with flowers, fruit
▲ ▼ flowering plants
▲ ▼ illustrations of how flower stalks on Oxalis stricta do not recurve under the flower
Yellow wood-sorrel, Oxalis, Sheep Sorrel, Sheep Showers (Oxalis stricta):
- creeping summer annual or perennial weed that produces rhizomes in the Oxalidaceae (Oxalis) family
- leaves have 3 heart-shaped leaflets-- similar to a clover, but each leaf more "notched" at tip; not a clover or legume
- small, yellow, 5-petalled flowers
- fruit pod an okra-shaped capsule; explodes when ripe, throwing seed several feet away
- gray-green woodsorrel fruit stalks bend down away from stem and pods are held upright
(see below)
- gray-green woodsorrel fruit stalks bend down away from stem and pods are held upright
(see below)
- both prefer part-shade, adequately moist, fertile soils, but grows about anywhere
- control primarily post-emergent in late spring; sometimes not easily controlled with single chemical-- may require mixture of post-emergents to control
- creeping woodsorrel: similar species; may be perennial in warm areas
- has more reddish leaves
- roots at nodes & produces stolons, not rhizomes
- common as a greenhouse pest