Publication: Edwards’s Bot. Reg. 15: t. 1249 1829.
From llifle page Acetosella maritima
Description
Oxalis tortuosa (syn. Oxalis maritima) is a snall perennial, subsucculent herb 5-15 cm tall with the leaves arising from the apex of short aerial stem, like a miniature tree. The leaves are characterized by long petioles with 3 small and almost linear leaflets at the end. O. tortuosa produces tiny yellow flowers in dense inflorescences.
Root: Fleshy and dilated, much like a carrot.
Stem: Tortuous and scaly up to 30 cm tall (usually shorter).
Leaves: Trifoliate. Petioles dark green 4-5 cm long filiform, thick, carnose. Leaflets 3, linear-elliptic to narrowly linear, fleshy somewhat blunt hairy underneath.
Inflorescence (umbels): The peduncle is as long as leaves but something longer. Umbels 4-8(-20) flowerered.
Flowers: 7-8 mm long, yellow, pedicellate. Sepals triangular or rhomboidal obtuse somewhat eroded (jagged) with their anterior margin coloured. Corolla longer than the calyx. Petals yellow cuneate more or less bordered or punctate with red. Stamens nearly equal to the styles Ovaria many seeded. Blooming in summer.
Origin and Habitat
South America, Central Chile, Regions: Atacama (III), Coquimbo (IV), Valparaíso (V), Del General Libertador Bernardo O’Higgins (VI) and Archipiélago de Juan Fernández (JF)
Altitude range. About 0-300 metres above sea level.
Habitat and ecology: Sand dunes in coastal region of central Chile. In habitat, the plant will go dormant in the summer and return to growth with the winter rain.
Cultivation and Propagation
Grow it in sunny, dry, rock crevices, in sandy well drained soil. It need protection against winter wet.
Bibliography
Major references and further lectures
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Lindley, J. 1829. Oxalis tortuosa, Edwards’s Botanical Register 15: t. 1249
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Meddelanden, Volumi 18-19, Göteborg (Sweden) Botaniska tradgården, Carl Skottsberg 1948
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HANBURYANA 4: (2009) 17 “Notes on two South American Oxalis” J.M.H. SHAW c/o Botany Department, RHS Garden Wisley
Source: Acetosella maritima, LLIFLE - Encyclopedia of living forms, CC-BY-SA, retrieved 2026-10-25.