Acacia subulata

Acacia subulata grows into a 3-metre tall and erect shrub.

The Awl-leaf Wattle is a New South Wales species and grows mostly from the central-coast / tablelands junction, north through the central western slopes, northern tablelands and north-western slopes, from around the Capertee Valley, north through the Upper Hunter Valley and Dubbo, as far north as around Warialda.

Australian Wattles at least, can be broadly placed into 1 of 3 recognisable groups:

• Group 1: Those that produce juvenile compound-bipinnate leaves and then change to producing adult-phyllodes which are modified-flattened petioles which form the foliage. This is combined with flowers produced in globular balls or heads (or ovoid heads). The heads can be singular in leaf/phyllode axils or arranged in groups.
• Group 2: As for Group 1 but flowers are produced in longer rod-like spikes.
• Group 3: Those that never produce phyllodes and retain the juvenile compound-bipinnate foliage into adulthood. These always produce flowers in globular balls (which are secondarily arranged into panicle or raceme-like groups in many cases).

This species belongs to Group 1.

The phyllodes are narrow and about 10 centimetres long with a curved point. The foliage is light green in colour, which provides a contrast with other foliage in the garden.

The yellow, globular flower heads hold up to 20 very small staminate flowers. The heads are clustered into racemes of up to 11 in leaf axils and are carried for most of the year with prime flowering in Autumn and Winter.

Linear pods follow the flowers are about 100 millimetres long.