Acacia empelioclada

Acacia empelioclada is a shrub of the genus Acacia and the subgenus Pulchellae that is endemic to an area along the south coast of southwestern Australia.

Description
The spindly erect shrub typically grows to a height of 0.5 to 2 m with ribbed, long soft haired, black to grey coloured branchlets. It has one to three pairs of pinnae that are 10 to 30 mm in length except for the proximal pinnae of multijugate leaves with a length of 2 to 12 mm. There are three to ten pairs of pinnules except for the proximal pinnae of multijugate leaves that have two to four pairs. The flat, green and glabrous pinnules have a narrowly oblong shape and are 4 to 10 mm in length and 1 to 3 mm wide. It blooms from July to October and produces yellow-cream flowers. The simple inflorescences occur in groups of one to two in the axils and have spherical flower-heads containing 25 to 43 cream to pale yellow coloured flowers. The seed pods that form after flowering have a length of 1 to 5 mm and a width of 6 to 9 mm with a single nerve with transversely arranged seeds inside.

Taxonomy
It belongs to the Acacia browniana group of wattles but resemble both Acacia leioderma and Acacia lateriticola.

Distribution
It is native to an area along the south coast in the Goldfields-Esperance and Great Southern regions of Western Australia where it is commonly situated in moist areas, on low rises and rocky hillsides growing in gravelly sandy soils over and around areas of laterite. The range of the plant extends from around Cape Riche in the west to the Fitzgerald River National Park as a part of mallee heath or mixed scrub communities.