Acacia abbreviata

General Plant Info

Acacia abbreviata Maslin is a low, spreading shrub ( up to 0.6m high), restricted to the Tanami district, N.T., near the W.A. border. With a average lifespan of 11-20 years, it grows in shallow red clay loam on stony lateritic plains and ridges with spinifex. It Flowers April to October.

An unusual flat phyllode form occurs at the type locality. Its phyllodes are 2–3 mm wide and oblong-oblanceolate, e.g. 6 km W of Tanami Mine, Apr. 1991, G.Tuckerman s.n. (NSW, PERTH). B.R.Maslin, in J.Jessop (ed.), Fl. Centr. Australia 137 (1981) suggested that A. abbreviata may be of hybrid origin ( A. hilliana x A. minutifolia ).

Geographic distribution

Identification

Spreading, ±glabrous, resinous shrub 0.3–0.6 m high, 1–3.6 m diam. Bark ±smooth, minutely fissured, pale greyish brown. Branchlets angular towards apices, yellowish to red-brown, minutely resin-haired, glabrescent; ridges obscure.

Phyllodes to 6 per node, linear, narrowly oblong or very narrowly oblanceolate, straight to shallowly sigmoid, ±terete, 0.4–2.5 cm long, 0.6–1.2 mm wide, mucronulate, thick, glabrous, multistriate; nerves indistinct; gland 1, obscure, basal, to 3 mm above pulvinus.

Spikes 0.7–1.5 (–2) cm long, golden.

Flowers 5-merous; calyx 1.0–1.4 mm long, dissected to 1/3–2/3, glabrous; corolla 1.6–2.2 mm long, dissected to 1/3–1/2, glabrous; ovary capped, glabrous, minutely tuberculate.

Pods linear-oblanceolate, tapering towards base, flat, 2.5–6.5 cm long, 3–5 mm wide, subwoody, opening elastically from apex; margins prominent.

Seeds oblique to longitudinal, narrowly oblong, 3–4.5 mm long, brown; funicle-aril narrowly turbinate.

Links

• http://www.worldwidewattle.com/speciesgallery/abbreviata.php
• http://www.landmanager.org.au/fire-responses-acacia-abbreviata