Oxalis acetosellaL.

European wood-sorrel

WFO wfo-0000387238 Accepted WFO 2026-06 8 photographs CC0 / CC BY

Plate 1 figs. a–h

Oxalis acetosella, photographed by Zeke Marshall
fig. a Zeke Marshall, CC BY 4.0 / 2022-06-13 / obs. 205810168
Oxalis acetosella, photographed by Елена Смирнова
fig. b Елена Смирнова, CC BY 4.0 / obs. 205659028
Oxalis acetosella, photographed by Paul Braun
fig. c Paul Braun, CC0 1.0 / obs. 205396088
Oxalis acetosella, photographed by Светлана Царахова
fig. d Светлана Царахова, CC0 1.0 / obs. 203381075
Oxalis acetosella, photographed by aga_l_
fig. e aga_l_, CC BY 4.0 / obs. 205218933
Oxalis acetosella, photographed by Alexis Tinker-Tsavalas
fig. f Alexis Tinker-Tsavalas, CC BY 4.0 / obs. 205534656
Oxalis acetosella, photographed by Alexis Tinker-Tsavalas
fig. g Alexis Tinker-Tsavalas, CC BY 4.0 / obs. 205535341
Oxalis acetosella, photographed by Lena Perova
fig. h Lena Perova, CC BY 4.0 / obs. 203562484

Every figure is a research-grade observation under CC0, CC BY or CC BY-SA, rehosted with the photographer’s name, the licence and the observation it came from. Photographs under a NonCommercial licence are excluded from this site and are never stored, which costs us a great many pictures and is not negotiable.

Flowering n = 2,500 observations

Peak flowering in Apr, from 2,500 community-annotated observations worldwide. This is a global aggregate, not a forecast for your garden: the same species flowers on different dates in different hemispheres, and citizen-science records cluster near cities, at weekends, and in spring. Where a species has fewer than 30 annotated records we do not draw this chart at all.

Also published as 31 synonyms

A synonym is not an error. It is a record of botanists disagreeing, in print, about where this plant belongs. Each of these was somebody’s considered answer.

  • Acetosella alba (Lam.) Kuntze
  • Oxalis acetosella f. albovenosa H.Lindb.
  • Oxalis acetosella f. lilacina (Lange) Brenner
  • Oxalis acetosella f. parviflora (Lej.) Bolzon
  • Oxalis acetosella prol. parviflora (Lej.) Rouy
  • Oxalis acetosella subsp. acetosella
  • Oxalis acetosella var. caerulea DC.
  • Oxalis acetosella var. coerulea DC.
  • Oxalis acetosella var. lilacina Lange
  • Oxalis acetosella var. parviflora Lej.
  • Oxalis acetosella var. parviflora (Lej.) DC.
  • Oxalis acetosella var. parviflora (Lej.) P.Fourn.
  • Oxalis acetosella var. purpurascens H.Mart.
  • Oxalis acetosella var. purpurea Lej.
  • Oxalis acetosella var. rosea Peterm.
  • Oxalis acetosella var. subpurpurascens DC.
  • Oxalis acetosella var. subpurpurascente DC.
  • Oxalis acetosella var. vegeta Tatew.
  • Oxalis acetosella var. violacea Anon.
  • Oxalis alba (Lam.) Steud.
  • Oxalis fragrans Tod.
  • Oxalis nemoralis Salisb.
  • Oxalis parviflora Lej.
  • Oxalis taquetii R.Knuth

and 7 more.

Sourcesevery claim on this page

  1. World Flora Online Plant List. accepted name, authority, classification. CC0. Retrieved 2026-07-12.
  2. iNaturalist. photographs and flowering annotations, CC0 / CC BY / CC BY-SA only. per photograph. Retrieved 2026-06-27.

We publish what we can source and we say so when we cannot. This page has no care advice, no toxicity claim and no native range, because we do not yet have those from a source we can cite.