Acacia xanthophloea
Contents
General Plant Info
Geographic distribution
Distribution: Native to southern and eastern Africa, including Botswana, Kenya, Malawi, Mozambique, Somalia, South Africa, Swaziland, Tanzania, Zambia and Zimbabwe. Naturalized in the USA and 3 trees are growing in S.E. Queensland, Australia.
Habitat: This species is found in low-lying areas in association with water. It grows in swampy areas, on the margins of lakes and pans and along river banks. It often forms dominant stands in seasonally flooded areas in alluvial soils (Smit 2008: 68).
Identification
Bark: The main stem of mature trees is smooth, with occasional irregular depressions and flaking, and is characteristically lime-green to greenish-yellow. Scars due to broken branches or other injuries are dark brown to black (Smit 2008: 68-69).
Spines: Straight, hairless and occur in pairs at nodes. Average length 40-85mm depending on age of tree (Smit 2008: 69).
Flowers: Globose flowering heads are borne at the nodes, mainly on previous seasons' shoots. They are bright yellow and 10-14mm in diameter (Smit 2008: 69).
Seed pods: The indehiscent pods are straight and hairless, and often have marked constrictions between seeds. Young pods are green while dry pods are dark brown, breaking up transversely into segments after being shed. They attain a length of 30-75mm and a width of 7-14mm. Seeds are elliptic (Smit 2008: 69).
