Plant Name
Scientific Name: Acacia constricta
Common Names: Whitethorn Acacia, White-thorn Acacia
Plant Characteristics
Duration: Perennial, Deciduous
Growth Habit: Tree, Shrub
Arizona Native Status: Native
Habitat: Desert, Upland
Flower Color: Yellow, fading to yellow-orange
Flowering Season: Summer
Height: To 10 feet (3 m) tall or more
Description: The flowers are clustered in fuzzy, 1/2 inch (1.3 cm) diameter balls. The flowers are followed by long, narrow, green to red-tinged seedpods that dry to a brown color. The leaves are bipinnately compound with tiny, green, oval leaflets. Some of the branches have distinctive, straight, white, up to 2 inch (5 cm) long thorns at the leaf axils.
Special Characteristics
Fragrant – The flowers are sweetly and intensely fragrant.
Classification
Kingdom: Plantae – Plants
Subkingdom: Tracheobionta – Vascular plants
Superdivision: Spermatophyta – Seed plants
Division: Magnoliophyta – Flowering plants
Class: Magnoliopsida – Dicotyledons
Subclass: Rosidae
Order: Fabales
Family: Fabaceae – Pea family
Genus: Acacia Mill. – acacia
Species: Acacia constricta Benth. – whitethorn acacia
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