Common Name

Woolly Wattle

Family

Fabaceae

Distribution

Known only from near Lake Biddy (N of Newdegate), near Lake Lockhart (c. 30 km S of Lake Biddy) and the type collection area c. 120 km NE of Lake Biddy, south-western W.A.

Description

Shrub 0.5–1.2 m high, dense to open, domed, erect or spreading. Branchlets densely white-woolly. New shoots yellow-green. Phyllodes narrowly elliptic to narrowly oblong-oblanceolate, 1.5–4 cm long, 3.5–10 mm wide, greyish green, densely woolly, with 3 main longitudinal nerves and with prominent longitudinally anastomosing secondary nerves in between; venation obscured by indumentum; gland 2–6 mm above pulvinus. Inflorescences simple, 1 per axil; peduncles 2–4 mm long, woolly; basal bract persistent; heads globular, 5–7 mm diam., 30–32-flowered, golden; bracteoles stipitate, ovate, short-acuminate, exserted in bud. Flowers 5-merous; sepals free. Pods oblong, to 2.5 cm long, 6–7 mm wide, thinly crustaceous, densely woolly. Seeds elliptic, 3 mm long, tan; aril subapical.

Habitat

Normally grows in slightly saline sand over clay along drainage channels, in low open scrub.

Specimens

W.A.: near Lake Biddy [precise locality withheld for conservation reasons], B.R.Maslin 6359 (CANB, K, MEL, NSW, Z); loc. id., P.G.Wilson 7167 (K, MEL, MO, PERTH).

Notes

A member of the ‘A. flavipila group’ related to A. cassicula. It is very distinctive on account of its dense, woolly indumentum.

Conservation

Gazetted a rare species in W.A.

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