What it is
Wood Sorrel (Oxalis species) is in the Oxalidaceae family. Looks like clover but tastes lemony-sour. Fun, safe in small amounts, and great for teaching kids to forage.
How to grow it
It wants part shade, water it moderate, and give it any soil. Target a soil pH around Adaptable. Expect roughly Most of year. Perennial.
How it's used
Wood Sorrel is used: raw nibble, garnish.
🔎 How to identify it
- Three heart-shaped leaflets (clover-like)
- Folds up at night
- Yellow/pink five-petal flowers
Edibility
How to grow & propagate wood 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 wood sorrel
Wood Sorrel is grown from seed. Start it in the season it favors, keep the seedbed evenly moist until it's up, and thin to give each plant room to size up.
Growing wood sorrel in Texas
Give it part shade and any soil. Match the spot to the plant and most of the battle is already won.
Time your planting to our long warm season and watch the frost dates at both ends; the live weather tool on this site is built for exactly that.
Keep moisture even, especially while it's young — deep, less-frequent soaks build better roots than a daily sprinkle.
Harvesting
Figure on roughly most of year before you're harvesting. The part you're after: leaves, flowers, seed pods.
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.
Before you forage it
A safety note, because this one grows wild: positive identification comes before anything goes in your mouth or your medicine. Confirm it on several features — leaf, stem, flower, smell — not a single resemblance, check the lookalike warnings, and never forage from roadsides or sprayed ground. When in doubt, leave it out.
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.