Oxalis

[David Shaw]

Mark
The little green leafed one is worse. I have plenty of both to swap if anyone wants them

[Diane Whitehead]

I can't do a picture of my thread-leaved oxalis yet - my camera has been on loan
photographing my grandchildren.

However, I investigated the roots to see what kind of storage organ they are
developing, and they aren't.  Just a single white thread root at the bottom of
each single green thread leaf.

Maybe I AM growing grass.  Just to check, I looked back at the first message posted,
and the round seeds are not at all grassy.

Do all oxalis have some sort of storage root?  When does that develop?

[Diane Whitehead]

Here's the photo of a purported seedling from Oxalis Gwen McBride (called Ewan McBride
in the last SRGC seedlist). 

An ungerminated seed is also shown.

Can this simple leaf possibly mature into the complex leaves of O. laciniata?

[mark smyth]

looks like a grass seedling like I get in my pots

[David Shaw]

I don't see any evidence of a seed, similar to the loose one, attached to the root of the seedling. I would deduce that the seedling is not related to the seed sown and, like Mark, would liken it to the grass that I am good at cultivating.

[Diane Whitehead]

They can't be grass.  They were attached to the seeds when they first sprouted,
though the attachments can barely be seen in the picture in the first message
in this discussion, taken when I removed the seeds from their plastic bag.


I don't sow large seeds into pots.  I presprout them, and only when they are growing
do they get put into a pot of soil-free mix.  I never get weeds until much later, when
the weeds are never grass, but instead, ferns and conifers.

[Lesley Cox]

Can this simple leaf possibly mature into the complex leaves of O. laciniata?

In a word - NO.

O. laciniata and similar-leaved species such as O. enneaphylla, germinate (with me anyway) as a trifoliate leaf, very tiny, with a distinct stem and the three leaflets on top of that. There's really no mistaking them for anything other than the mature species. Oxalis seeds in this section are very pale, almost milk-white, rather than dark like yours. I'd suggest some other kind of bulbous plant. The seed isn't like a grass seed either.

Many oxalis don't have a storage organ though. Think of that beastly little O. corniculata which crepes around one's drabas and other cushions and is impossible to get rid of. It has a root system like most other small herbaceous plant, no bulbs at all.

[Paul T]

The flower on 'Gwen McBride' is an absolute corker.  Those veined type flowers are very pretty in the pics I have seen.  Never actually come across them in person here in Aus as yet, but maybe one day.

Good luck with the seedlings Diane,  Apparently the bulbous Oxalis seldom set seed in captivity, so you've done well.  I can't recall ever seeing seed on any of my Oxalis (Yes, another one of my addictions! <sigh>  Is there anything I don't try to collect?) collection other than O. carnosa which is one of the species that forms a succulent trunk type arrangement.  The seeds look the right shape, but the shoots I would agree just don't look right for what I'd be expecting from Oxalis.  I would be very doubtful though that a simple linear leaf like that would be an Oxalis seedling, but it is possible as I haven't grown them from seed myself.  I would have expected all Oxalis to have tripartite lseed leaves myself.

The range of leaf forms in Oxalis is amazing.  There are those as mentioned with thread-like blades on their leaves (grouped like fingers on a hand), some look like miniature fern/palm leaves that you'd never believe were Oxalis unless you were told.  Some of the species have leaves that fold up at night so they look totally different to in the daytime, etc.  A rather facinating genus, albeit much maligned because of their weedy relatives who are to be avoided at all costs.  The good thing is that most of them DON'T set seed much, because that allows them to be contained in pots successfully.