Acacia georginae F.M.Bailey, Bot. Bull. Dept. Agric. 13: 9, pl. 4 (1896)
Georgina Gidgee , Poison Gidyea
Malodorous, gnarled or spreading tree 3–8 m high; crown dense. Branchlets with a grey-white, mealy bloom, sparsely appressed-puberulous. Phyllodes narrowly elliptic, narrowed at both ends, straight to shallowly recurved, 4–11 cm long, 4–16 mm wide, with grey-white bloom as on branchlets, sparsely appressed-puberulous, 1–3 nerves more evident than the numerous closely parallel, indistinct intervening ones. Inflorescences 5–15-headed racemes; raceme axes 4–8 (–20) mm long, sericeous; peduncles 7–12 mm long; heads globular, 4–4.5 mm diam., 20–25-flowered, golden. Flowers 5-merous; sepals free; petals sparsely to densely appressed-puberulous. Pods curved to openly once-coiled, flat, 6–13 cm long, 12–25 mm wide, chartaceous, coarsely reticulate, glabrous. Seeds transverse to oblique, discoid, flat, peripherally crested, 9–12 mm long, dull, dark brown; funicle scarcely arillate.
Occurs in arid eastern Australia, especially in south-eastern N.T., extending into Qld to the Georgina R. basin and just into S.A. Usually grows on plains and along watercourses in clay and loam, often dominating in low woodland and low open woodland.
Closely related to A. cambagei but, unlike that species, it contains fluoroacetic acid and is extremely poisonous to livestock. The foetid odour (which is especially evident during wet weather or when the phyllodes are crushed) of this species and A. cambagei occurs also in A. pachycarpa .
Type of accepted name
Georgina R., Qld, [probably E.W.Bick ]; holo: BRI; probable iso: NSW.
Synonymy
Racosperma georginae (F.M.Bailey) Pedley, Austrobaileya 2: 349 (1987). Type: as for accepted name.
Illustrations
F.M.Bailey, loc. cit .; G.M.Chippendale & B.R.Jephcott, Fodder Trees & Shrubs Central Australia pls 7 & 8 (1963); S.L.Everist, Div. Pl. Indust. Advisory Leafl . No. 1024: pl. 16 (1969); K.Askew & A.S.Mitchell, Fodder Trees & Shrubs N. Terr. 19 (1978); D.J.E.Whibley & D.E.Symon, Acacias S. Australia 2nd edn, 237 (1992).
Representative collections
N.T.: 48 km E of Alice Springs, J.R.Maconochie 2504 (PERTH); 83.7 km S of Alice Springs, D.J.Nelson 516 (PERTH). S A.: Mt Dare Stn, P.K.Latz 4776 (PERTH). Qld: 38 km NW of Oban Stn, R.A.Perry 802 (CANB n.v. , NSW, PERTH).
(RSC)
The information presented here originally appeared on the WATTLE CD-ROM which was jointly published by the Australian Biological Resources Study, Canberra, and the Department of Parks and Wildlife, Perth; it was produced by CSIRO Publishing from where it is available for purchase. The WATTLE custodians are thanked for allowing us to post this information here.
