What it is
Garden Sorrel (Rumex acetosa) is in the Polygonaceae (Knotweed) family. Tart lemony leaves for soups and sauces, cut fresh from a perennial clump much of the year.
How to grow it
It wants full sun to part shade, water it moderate, and give it rich, moist soil. Target a soil pH around 5.5–6.8. Space plants about 12 in apart. Expect roughly Cut as needed. Hardy perennial.
How it's used
Garden Sorrel is used: soups, sauces, raw young.
🔎 How to identify it
- Arrow-shaped bright green leaves
- Clumping rosette
- Tall reddish flower stalks
Edibility
How to grow & propagate garden sorrel
Everything I've worked out about starting this one, keeping it alive through a Texas year, and turning one plant into many — free.
How to propagate garden sorrel
This family — sorrel, dock, buckwheat, rhubarb — grows easily from seed, and the perennial members (sorrel, rhubarb) clump up and can be divided in early spring. Buckwheat is so fast from seed it's used as a quick cover crop, flowering in about three weeks.
Growing garden sorrel in Texas
Give it full sun to part shade and rich, moist soil. Match the spot to the plant and most of the battle is already won.
Because it's a perennial, the work is mostly up front. Get it sited and established and it comes back on its own year after year — one of the best returns on effort in the whole garden.
Keep moisture even, especially while it's young — deep, less-frequent soaks build better roots than a daily sprinkle.
Harvesting
Figure on roughly cut as needed before you're harvesting. Pick herbs in the morning after the dew dries for the strongest oils, and harvest little and often — regular cutting keeps a herb bushy and stops it bolting. The part you're after: leaves.
Making more for free
Every seed we sell is open-pollinated, which means you can save your own from the best plants and it'll grow true next year. Let a few of your strongest plants finish and go to seed, dry it fully, and store it cool and dark. That's the whole point of heirlooms — buy once, grow forever.
Part of the free Texas Roots plant database, compiled by Jordan Polasek from his greenhouse in El Campo, Texas. Free to read and share. If it helped, the best thanks is to grow something.