Acacia calcicola


Acacia calcicola, commonly known as shrubby wattle, shrubby mulga, myall-gidgee, northern myall and grey myall is a species of flowering plant in the family Fabaceae and is native to arid areas of central Australia. The Pitjantjatjara peoples know the tree as ikatuka, the Warlpiri know it as jirlarti and the Arrernte know it as irrakwetye. It is a rounded shrub or straggly tree, with narrowly linear, linear or very narrowly elliptic phyllodes, spherical heads of golden yellow flowers, and more or less woody pods resembling a string of beads up to long.

Description

Acacia calcicola is rounded shrub or straggly tree that typically grows to a height of and often has multiple stems at the base and a spreading bushy crown. The phyllodes are variably shaped, narrowly linear to linear or very narrowly elliptic, straight to slightly curved, long and wide. The phyllodes have a more or less hooked end and are leathery and densely covered with soft hairs pressed against the surface. The flower are borne in 2 to 5 spherical heads in racemes long on a peduncle long. Each head is in diameter and has 30 to 60 golden yellow flowers. Flowering occurs from August to December and the pods are up to long, wide, wrinkled and woody, resembling a string of beads. The seeds are dull brown, elliptic and long with a club-shaped aril.
This species is closely related to Acacia cana which has silvery young phyllodes, and to Acacia coriacea which has longer phyllodes.

Taxonomy

Acacia calcicola was first formally described 1958 by Neville Forde and Ernest Horace Ising in the Transactions of the Royal Society of South Australia from specimens collected by Ising by road south-west of Oodnadatta. The specific epithet refers to the calcareous soils with which the species is commonly associated.

Distribution and habitat

This species of wattle is widespread in arid central Australia and is found in the southern Northern Territory the Central Ranges, Great Sandy Desert, Great Victoria Desert bioregions of Western Australia, central-western South Australia, near Tibooburra in the far north-west of New South Wales with scattered populations in south-west Queensland. It grows along ephemeral watercourses and on degraded sand dunes as part of low open woodland and tall open shrubland communities. It grows well in heavy calcareous soils usually over limestone and is often associated with Acacia aneura.