''Acacia bromilowiana'', commonly known as Bromilow's wattle, is a tree belonging to the genus ''
Acacia
''Acacia'', commonly known as the wattles or acacias, is a large genus of shrubs and trees in the subfamily Mimosoideae of the pea family Fabaceae. Initially, it comprised a group of plant species native to Africa and Australasia. The genus na ...
'' and the subgenus ''Juliflorae'' that is
endemic to a small part of north western
Australia
Australia, officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a Sovereign state, sovereign country comprising the mainland of the Australia (continent), Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous List of islands of Australia, sma ...
.
Description
The tree grows to a maximum height of with dark grey, fibrous bark.
[ The tree usually has a gnarled or erect habit and is most often found with a height of with a dbh of around . It usually has a single or two crooked main stems that form more branches at a height of with a dense to domed sprawling crown. The reddish terete branchlets have obscure ribbing and have a white powdery covering. The grey-green coloured ]phyllode
Phyllodes are modified petioles or leaf stems, which are leaf-like in appearance and function. In some plants, these become flattened and widened, while the leaf itself becomes reduced or vanishes altogether. Thus the phyllode comes to serve the ...
s have an asymmetrically lanceolate to narrowly elliptic shape and are widest below the middle. The phyllodes have a length of and a width of and are straight to shallowly recurved and can be slightly undulate with fine numerous parallel longitudinal nerves numerous.[
]
Taxonomy
The species was first formally described by the botanist Bruce Maslin in 2008 as part of the work ''New taxa of Acacia (Leguminosae: Mimosoideae) and notes on other species from the Pilbara and adjacent desert regions of Western Australia'' as published in the journal '' Nuytsia''.specific epithet
In taxonomy, binomial nomenclature ("two-term naming system"), also called nomenclature ("two-name naming system") or binary nomenclature, is a formal system of naming species of living things by giving each a name composed of two parts, bot ...
honours Robert Neil Bromilow who was a Technical Officer in the Pilbara who also maintained and curated the collection from the now disbanded Pilbara Regional Herbarium in located in Karratha.[
]
Distribution
It is native to an area of the Pilbara region of Western Australia and is found in a variety of situations including creek beds, rocky hills, scree slopes, gorges, and breakaways growing in skeletal stony loam soils that are pebbly to gravelly over laterite
Laterite is both a soil and a rock type rich in iron and aluminium and is commonly considered to have formed in hot and wet tropical areas. Nearly all laterites are of rusty-red coloration, because of high iron oxide content. They develop by ...
, ironstone and basalt.Ophthalmia Range
The Ophthalmia Range is a Mountain range, range in the Pilbara region of Western Australia. It is approximately north of Perth, Western Australia, Perth; the nearest town is Newman, Western Australia, Newman, approximately to the south in the ...
and on the Hancock Ranges to around Newman
Newman is a surname of English origin and may refer to many people:
The surname Newman is widespread in the core Anglosphere.
A
*Abram Newman (1736–1799), British grocer
*Adrian Newman (disambiguation), multiple people
*Al Newman (born 1960) ...
. Another population is found on Balfour Downs Station to the northeast of Newman.[ It is often found amongst open low eucalypt woodlands communities consisting of '' Eucalyptus leucophloia'' and '']Corymbia hamersleyana
''Corymbia hamersleyana'' is a species of small tree or mallee that is endemic to the Pilbara region of Western Australia. It has rough, flaky bark on part or all of the trunk, smooth cream-coloured bark above, lance-shaped adult leaves, flower ...
'' over '' spinifex''.[
]
See also
* List of ''Acacia'' species
References
{{Taxonbar, from=Q17438735
bromilowiana
Acacias of Western Australia
Plants described in 2008
Taxa named by Bruce Maslin