Acacia jackesiana
# Acacia jackesiana

Acacia jackesiana, also known as Betsy's wattle, is a shrub belonging to the genus Acacia and the subgenus Juliflorae that is native to north eastern Australia.

It is named for the botanist Dr Betsy Jackes (1935–), a professor at the James Cook University of North Queensland.

## Description

The prostrate shrub typically grows to a height of 1 metre (3 ft) and has red-brown coloured angular branchlets. Like most species of Acacia it has phyllodes rather than true leaves. The evergreen, glabrous phyllodes have a tetragonous-terete cross-section and are 9 to 14 cm (3.5 to 5.5 in) in length and 0.8 to 1 mm (0.031 to 0.039 in) wide. The phyllodes are made up of overlapping scaly lobes and have one dominant nerve at each angle with a total of 8 to 12 nerves. It blooms from July and October producing yellow flowers. The cylindrical flower-spikes have a length of 1.2 to 2.2 cm (0.47 to 0.87 in) packed with golden coloured flowers. The sub-woody, glabrous seed pods that form after flowering are linear and tapered at each end. The pods have a length of 6 to 10.5 cm (2.4 to 4.1 in) with prominent fawn coloured margins. The light brown seeds inside are arranged longitudinally and have an elliptic shape with a length of 4.8 to 5.4 mm (0.19 to 0.21 in) and have a thin pleurogram.

## Distribution

It is endemic to parts of north-eastern Queensland including around the Argentine mine which is found approximately 60 km (37 mi) south west of Townsville where it is situated on plains and in gorges growing in brown loamy soils overlying Argentine schist bedrock as a part of Eucalyptus woodland communities.

