Acacia armigera
Acacia armigera, commonly known as fierce wattle, is a species of flowering plant in the family Fabaceae and is endemic to a restricted area of inland Western Australia. It is a dense, rounded shrub with rigid, sharply-pointed phyllodes that are pentagonal in cross section, spherical heads of bright yellow flowers, and pods that are round in cross section, and up to long.
Description
Acacia armigera is a dense, rounded shrub that typically grows to a high and wide. Its phyllodes are pentagonal in cross section with equal faces and sharply-pointed, long and wide. The flowers are bright yellow and borne pairs in axils long on peduncles long, each head with 17 to 23 flowers. Flowering has been observed in late August and the pods are crusty, curved, round in cross section, long and wide.
Taxonomy
Acacia armigera was first formally described by the Robert Wayne Davis, Kevin R. Thiele and Geoff T.B. Cockerton in 2023 in the journal Nuytsia from specimens collected by Thiele and Cockerton near Mount Dimer, north of Southern Cross in 2021. The specific epithet means 'bearing thorns, or armed'.
Distribution
Fierce wattle is only known from the type location near Mount Dimer where it grows in open woodland on red-brown clay in the Coolgardie bioregion of inland Western Australia.
Conservation status
This Acacia species is classified as "Priority One" by the Government of Western Australia Department of Parks and Wildlife, meaning that it is known from only one or a few locations which are potentially at risk.