''Acacia desmondii'', also known as Des Nelson wattle
is a shrub 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 native to central
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 ...
. It is listed a
vulnerable.
[
]
Description
The tree typically grows to a maximum height of and has a shrubby habit.[ It grows to a width of and has a dense canopy.]minni ritchi Minni ritchi bark on an acacia in the Pilbara region of Western Australia Minni ritchi bark of ''Eucalyptus crucis'' near Wongan Hills
Minni ritchi is a type of reddish-brown bark that continuously peels in small curly flakes, leaving the tre ...
style bark further up and on the main branches. The terete and glabrous branchlets have obscure ridges. Like most species of ''Acacia'' it has 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 rather than true leaves. The linear evergreen phyllodes taper towards the base and are infrequently curved towards the apex. The glabrous phyllodes have a length of and a width of flattened but still quite thick and uniformly finely striated with an obscure midnerve surrounded by many closely spaced longitudinal nerves. It blooms between July and November producing golden flowers. The cylindrical flower-spikes are situated on condensed axillary racemes and have a length of with light golden coloured flowers. The brittle and glabrous seed pod
This page provides a glossary of plant morphology. Botanists and other biologists who study plant morphology use a number of different terms to classify and identify plant organs and parts that can be observed using no more than a handheld magnify ...
s that form after flowering have a linear shape that is straight to slightly curved and are raised over and constricted between seeds with a length of and a width of and are longitudinally wrinkled. The shiny black seeds in the pods are arranged longitudinally and have an oblong-elliptic shape with a length of with a pale halo and an open areole.
Taxonomy
The 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 Des Nelson, a botanist who lived in Alice Springs, and the first to collect the species in 1964.[ This species was originally described as ''Acacia nelsonii'' by Maslin in 1980, however, the name had been previously used by William Safford in 1914 for a Mexican species.][Safford, W.E. (1914]
J. Wash. Acad. Sci. 4: 363.
/ref>
Distribution
It is endemic
Endemism is the state of a species being found in a single defined geographic location, such as an island, state, nation, country or other defined zone; organisms that are indigenous to a place are not endemic to it if they are also found elsew ...
to a small area among the plains and hills of the Rodinga Range, Train Hills and Pillar Range on Allambi Station and Todd River Station in the southern part of the Northern Territory
The Northern Territory (commonly abbreviated as NT; formally the Northern Territory of Australia) is an states and territories of Australia, Australian territory in the central and central northern regions of Australia. The Northern Territory ...
to the south of Alice Springs
Alice Springs ( aer, Mparntwe) is the third-largest town in the Northern Territory of Australia. Known as Stuart until 31 August 1933, the name Alice Springs was given by surveyor William Whitfield Mills after Alice, Lady Todd (''née'' Al ...
where it is often situated along stony watercourses and in dry rocky gullies at the foot of the ranges and on rocky cliffs composed of sandstone
Sandstone is a clastic sedimentary rock composed mainly of sand-sized (0.0625 to 2 mm) silicate grains. Sandstones comprise about 20–25% of all sedimentary rocks.
Most sandstone is composed of quartz or feldspar (both silicates) ...
.[
]
See also
* List of ''Acacia'' species
References
{{Taxonbar, from=Q9564050
desmondii
Flora of the Northern Territory
Taxa named by Bruce Maslin
Plants described in 1987