Have you seen this weed?

Yesterday I wrote about animal pests, and today, to demonstrate my great versatility, I've moved on to pests of the plant variety. I think I might have one of those, too. Not sure.

You see, I read Mike's post about his battle with the wicked Oxalis plant and began to worry that the delicate little yellow flowers scattered about my own backyard might be Oxalis, too. I'd never worried about them before--never given them much thought one way or the other, actually--but a seed of doubt had been planted in my fertile mind.

I commented on Mike's blog to thank him for alerting me to the potential for damage, and in response he gave me the additional information that Oxalis is sometimes known as Sour Grass and is actually kind of tasty.

So now I've put the worry on hold and have settled for the moment on confusion. I don't think Sour Grass is what I have. I remember chewing on Sour Grass dozens of times in both Missouri and Texas, and it was different from what I have here in Louisiana. What I knew as Sour Grass had clusters of three smooth-edged, heart-shaped leaves. The stuff I have now is similar in size and also has clusters of three leaves, but as the picture above shows, my current plant's leaves are pointy, with ragged edges. The flowers are a little different, too (aside from the fact that the one pictured was smooshed in my scanner), with narrower leaves than the Sour Grass I remember.

Oh, and I almost forgot to mention the berries. I don't know whether one plant makes the little yellow flowers and the berries, or whether there are two weeds, with similar leaves, vying for the same spot of ground. Everywhere the little yellow flowers were, though, there were also tiny, strawberry-looking thingies, each about the size of the nail on my pinky finger. I'm saying "were" because there are almost no flowers left and not one single berry, and I hadn't even noticed they were gone. The picture at left shows what it all looked like a couple of months ago.

I'll add, in case it provides a clue, that the plant that's in my yard grows very close to the ground. I suppose I could also give it the taste test, but I'll pass, if you don't mind. There are too many dogs in my backyard.

So what do you think, Mike? Does this look like your Oxalis? Any ideas, you gardeners out there?