White Throated Sparrow

Acacia anserina, also known as hairy sandstone wattle,^[1] is a shrub of the genus Acacia and the subgenus Plurinerves. It is native to a small area in the Kimberley region of Western Australia.^[2]

The shrub typically grows to a height of around 1 m (3 ft 3 in) and has an erect, openly branched habit. It has ribbed branchlets that are densely hairy and has persistent stipules that are 1 to 1.5 mm (0.039 to 0.059 in) in length. Like most species of Acacia it has phyllodes rather than true leaves. The evergreen dimidiate phyllodes have a widely elliptic or occasionally widely obovate shape with a rounded upper margin and a more or less straight lower margin. The hairy phyllodes are 3 to 6 mm (0.12 to 0.24 in) in length and 2.5 to 4 mm (0.098 to 0.157 in) wide and have many longitudinal indistinct nerves.^[1] When it blooms it produces simple inflorescences with spherical flower-heads containing 17 to 25 light golden coloured flowers. Following flowering flat and narrowly oblong red-brown seed pods form that are 4 to 5 mm (0.16 to 0.20 in) in length.^[1]

The species was first formally described by the botanists Bruce Maslin, Matthew David Barrett and Russell Lindsay Barrett in 2013 as part of the work A baker's dozen of new wattles highlights significant Acacia (Fabaceae: Mimosoideae) diversity and endemism in the north-west Kimberley region of Western Australia as published in the journal Nuytsia.^[3]

It is confined to a small area in the Princess May Range on gentle slopes under sandstone ridges among a fire-protected pocket of dense vegetation in the west Kimberley.^[1]

• List of Acacia species