WATTLE

Acacias of Australia

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Acacia flavescens A.Cunn. ex Benth.

Common Name

Yellow Wattle, Red Wattle

Family

Fabaceae

Distribution

Widespread, mainly in near-coastal areas, from Cape York S to Brisbane, eastern Qld.

Description

Tree 4–20 m high. Bark rough, furrowed and somewhat shaggy. Branchlets stellate-hairy; hairs golden on new shoots. Phyllodes inequilaterally narrowly elliptic to lanceolate, ±falcate, 9–30 cm long, 2–6 cm wide, acuminate (except young plants), ±glabrous, with 3 prominent main nerves (only the lowermost reaching apex) and obviously reticulate in between; basal gland elongated, with 3 or 4 additional smaller glands in indentations or occasionally on short projections along upper margin. Inflorescences in axillary racemes or terminal panicles, sometimes leafy; raceme axes 2–10 cm long, golden stellate-puberulous; peduncles 6–28 mm long, 1 to several per node, yellowish stellate-puberulous; heads globular, 4.5–6 mm diam., 30–60-flowered, cream-coloured. Flowers 5-merous; sepals 2/3–3/4-united. Pods flat, to 12 cm long, 1.5–2 cm wide, thinly coriaceous, transversely reticulate, glabrous. Seeds transverse, elliptic, 6–7 mm long, dull, black, arillate.

Habitat

Grows in sand, in eucalypt forest and woodland.

Specimens

Qld: Little Ramsay Bay, Hinchinbrook Is., R.Cumming 2868 (PERTH); 1.9 km E of Watsonville, C.F.Puttock & P.G.Wilson UNSW13353 (PERTH).

Notes

Seemingly related to A. leptoloba which is most readily distinguished by having smaller, obtuse phyllodes and golden stellate hairs confined to tips of raceme axes and very young phyllodes.

FOA Reference

Data derived from Flora of Australia Volumes 11A (2001), 11B (2001) and 12 (1998), products of ABRS, ©Commonwealth of Australia

Author

R.S.Cowan, B.R.Maslin

Minor edits by J.Rogers