Yellow spring meadows on the Amalfi coast: Oxalis pes-caprae

The grassy area here is not only lush green now in spring, usually it is now dotted with lots of tiny little flowers: What is your first impression when you drive along the coast these days, in the second part of March and April, or when you go for a walk in lemon or olive groves? The impression is that you are surrounded by innumerable yellow flower heads everywhere you go. They are called oxalis pescaprae, They even behave as piante sfuggite, meaning they conquer their territory even  beyond the lush grassy meadows of the lemon and orange fruit gardens. 

Oxalis pes-caprae yellow patches amidst the citrus groves of Sorrento: I giardini di Cataldo

Oxalsi pes-caprae lands

You also find them at the feet of pot plants, like oleanders on the terraces of Capri, Sorrento and the Amalfi coast. It is the so-called oxalis pes-capre (capra meaning goat, as their leaves faintly look like goat feet). So the meadows really turn a beautiful sun yellow, made up of blossomos of dandelion, for sure, but also and in particular of these bermuda buttercups, as they are also called in English. History has it that a monk from Genoa, Carlo Giacinto, brought this plant to Italy from South Africa at the beginning of the 19th century.

thick yellow carpets in the orchards

Tappetti gialli: Giardini di Cataldo, Sorrento, April

In the meanwhile, it could be considered as omnipresent here in the South, and "invasive" (infestante as it is called in Italian). 

little yellow oxalis pes-caprae also grows on the tuff stone walls in Sorrento

Oxalis pes-caprae in Anacapri !!

In the flower pots, with oleanders

Because you can even find them both in formal gardens (like the garden of Villa San Michele in Anacapri), but also on the rocks and steep cliffs along the shore towards the Faraglioni in Capri, on Monte Barbarossa and Monte Solaro, just as in the lemon yards of Sorrento and the olive groves of Castellamare.