Bailey's acacia

Acacia baileyana, commonly called Bailey's acacia or Cootamundra wattle, is a small evergreen tree in the Fabaceae family, endemic to a small area of New South Wales but now widely planted as an ornamental worldwide. It typically reaches 5 to 10 metres in height with a broadly spreading, often weeping crown. The foliage is highly distinctive: bipinnate, finely divided silvery-blue to grey-green leaves with numerous tiny leaflets, giving a soft feathery appearance. From mid-winter to early spring it produces a profuse display of bright golden-yellow globular flower heads in long axillary racemes, each head a fragrant pompom of many fine stamens. Fruits are flat, straight to slightly curved legume pods 4 to 10 cm long, blue-green when young and ripening dark brown, containing several seeds with a small aril. The bark is smooth and grey, becoming finely fissured with age. It naturalises readily outside its native range and is considered weedy in parts of Australia.