Flinders Range wattle

Appearance

The shrub has a weeping habit and typically grows to a height of 2 to 5 metres with a crown width of 2 to 5 m. Young plants are glabrous and have greenish coloured bark that later becomes brown in colour as the plant ages. The slender grey-green foliage has pink-red tips of new growth.

The long slender phyllodes are arranged alternately and have a prominent single vein running lengthwise and grow up to 10 centimetres in length. It produces yellow flowers from March to September. The flowers are arranged into small spherical clusters that are found in short compound clusters in the phyllode forks. The flower heads have a diameter of 5 to 8 millimetres and contain 12 to 17 pale to lemon yellow flowers. The thin leathery light brown seed pods that form following flowering are elongated and flat usually 5 to 13 centimetres in length and 6 to 12 mm wide. The pods contains hard black ellipsoidal shape seeds that are 6 mm in length and half as wide.

Distribution

It is native to the Flinders Range, Gawler Range and Eye Peninsula of South Australia. In these areas it is found among rocky outcrops on hillsides or along rocky creek beds. The shrub is now also found in parts of New South Wales and western Victoria where it is an invasive species. It also is invasive in Western Australia where it is also an invasive species that has become naturalised. It has a sporadic distribution in an area through the South West, Wheatbelt and Great Southern regions where it is found among Jarrah forest in sandy soils.