Plants of South Eastern New South Wales
Oxalis exilis
Common name
Shade Wood-sorrel
Family
Oxalidaceae
Where found
Moist places in dry forest and woodland. Occasional garden weed. Coastal sands. Along streams and in winter-wet depressions. Widespread.
Notes
Perennial herb to 0.35 m high or sprawling, often creeping, often rooting at the nodes. Very sparsely hairy. Roots fibrous; bulbs and bulbils absent. Leaves clustered, compound, with 3 bilobed leaflets, the leaflets 0.25–1.3 cm long, 3–16 mm wide, usually green, more or less hairless above, hairy below, margins fringed, the lobe tips blunt and 2–3 mm apart. Stipules to about 2 mm long, conspicuous, tips lobed or squared off, or inconspicuous with the tips tapering abruptly to the leaf stalks, margins fringed. Flowers yellow, with 5 petals each 4.5–10 mm long. Flower clusters 1- or 2-flowered. Flowering: most of the year. Seed cases 5-13 mm long, 2–3 mm in diameter, usually much less than 10 mm long, usually moderately hairy with hairs pointing down, sometimes with longer, scattered, spreading hairs as well (needs a hand lens or a macro app on your phone/tablet to see).
All native plants on unleased land in the ACT are protected.
PlantNET description: http://plantnet.rbgsyd.nsw.gov.au/cgi-bin/NSWfl.pl?page=nswfl&lvl=sp&name=Oxalis~exilis (accessed 29 January, 2021)
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