While the genus Oxalis has a few species that are known “bad actors”, it has many others that are amazing garden gems. One of our favorites has always been Oxalis palmifrons. Hailing from South Africa’s Southwest Cape Province, this gem forms texturally-fascinating, ground-hugging rosettes, that are right at home in the rock garden. We grow ours in a gravelly rock garden, where it receives 4-6 hours of sun in the afternoon. Although it takes many years for it to develop a decent sized patch, we think it’s worth the wait. This species is a winter grower, disappearing underground for the summer, and re-emerging in very late fall. Because it’s so slow to offset, it’s been over a decade since we’ve had enough to share. Hardiness Zone 7b-10b, but it makes a lovely small container specimen where it isn’t winter hardy.
Beautiful! Does it bloom?
We have only observed a small number of flowers in the 20 years we’ve grown it.
Though they come from vastly different environs the South African Palm-leaf Wood Sorrel, Oxalis palmifrons appears to have undergone a convergent evolution similar to our NC native fan clubmoss Lycopodium digitatum and tree clubmoss Dendrolycopodium obscurum, both of which thrive in moist mature woodlands across the state. I haven’t tried them but understand our native clubmosses are very slow and difficult to grow, possibly due to synergetic relationship with certain fungi and microbes, making conditions hard to replicate in the garden landscape.
https://plants.ces.ncsu.edu/plants/lycopodium-obscurum/
https://plants.ces.ncsu.edu/plants/lycopodium-digitatum/#:~:text=Fan%20Clubmoss%20is%20the%20most,does%20best%20with%20even%20moisture.