Robinia pseudacacia
false acacia
Deciduous tree, to 25 m high; twigs puberulent when young, angled, usually with stout scattered stipular spines up to c. 1 cm long. Lvs glabrous to puberulent particularly below, petiolate; leaflets ovate to elliptic, acute or obtuse, sometimes shortly mucronate, in 4-10 ± opposite pairs, (10)-20-40-(50) mm long, stipellate; petiolules 2-5 mm long. Raceme with numerous fls; pedicels 5-10 mm long. Calyx puberulent; calyx teeth unequal, broadly triangular. Corolla white with the base of standard greenish or yellowish, 15-23 mm long. Pod glabrous, irregularly oblong, 2-8-seeded, 35-80 mm long; seeds smooth, brown- spotted, oblong.
N.: locally common throughout; S.: occasional in Nelson, Marlborough, Westland, Canterbury, Otago.
C. and E. North America 1870
Waste places, scrubland, forest margins and clearings.
FL Nov-Jan.
Poisonous (Connor 1977).
False acacia is used in soil conservation, and grown as an ornamental tree. The sp. suckers freely and forms small thickets from plantings; it has become a problem in some reserves and parks in the North Id. Cvs include forms with golden or gold-green lvs, and forms without spines, but almost all naturalised material is green-leaved and spiny.
