PlantFiles: Sea Purslane
Sesuvium portulacastrum

This plant in my experience does most definitely not require constantly moist soil. It grows in full sun, in sandy poor soil with essentially no care and no irrigation required. Often present in neglected "lawns", cracks in sidewalks, untended commercial landscapes near the shore. Have seen variation in leaf and flower size. Very attractive, delicate, mat forming plant. Could be a useful no care ground cover in difficult areas.

Sea Purslane or Shoreline Seapurslane (Sesuvium portulacastrum) is a superb, mat-forming, creeping seaside plant in coastal areas. It helps stabalize shorelines and dunes and is great and very useful for preventing erosion. It is native to the southeastern coastal U.S. from North Carolina south through Florida, the Keys and throughout much of or all of the Caribbean and Bahamas, west along the Gulf coast into Texas and Mexico. It is also found throughout tropical and subtropical shorelines and coastal areas worldwide. It has thin, short, leathery leaves that are edible and reportedly taste crisp and salty and have useful vitamins and minerals in them. It also has attractive, small, somewhat inconspicuous white to purple or pinkish flowers. A very useful, mat-forming, dune-stabalizing native perennial plant for coastal situations from zone 8b in the U.S. south through zone 11 strictly on the coastline and in salty situations such as marshes or mangrove swamps near the coastline! The leaves are leathery and thin. This plant forms a covering mat or creeping, covering vine-like groundcover.

MORE FACTS - Stabalizes coastal dunes and shorelines, preventing erosion. Grows in coastal or salty situations such as coastal dunes, shorelines, coastal dune scrub and coastal sandy scrub, mangrove and lagoon shorelines and salt marshes. Grows well next to or on stone breakwaters and seawalls. Grows in U.S. from zone 8b south through zone 11. Native to the U.S., Mexico, Caribbean, Bahamas and tropical and subtropical shorelines worldwide. The leaves are edible and have valuable vitamins and minerals and a crisp, salty taste. Grows well next to the ocean as well as in salt marshes, lagoon shorelines and mangrove swamps (all salty situations) near the coast. In Florida, found in every coastal county except a few in the northwest half of the state.

Prostrate, mat forming, herbaceous perennial with opposite, fleshy, red tinged leaves that can be up to 2 inches long and .5 inches wide. The tiny pinkish purple flowers are solitary in the leaf axils and bloom all year. Its natural habitat is tropical and subtropical coastal shorelines throughout the world. Sea Purslane is an important dune stabalizer on many beaches.
Medicinally this plant has been used to treat scurvy, a vitamin C deficiency and is sold in Asia as a vegetable. In the Caribbean, the leaves are pulverized and used to soothe puncture wounds caused by venomous fish.