Acacia besleyi Maslin

Rounded or obconicoften bushy, resinous shrub 1–3 m high. Bark stringy and fibrous, grey externally but the new bark beneath reddish brown. Branchlets smooth or tuberculate, glabrous or ± sparsely appressed hairy. Phyllodes linear, gradually narrowed towards base, mostly shallowly incurved, erect, thinly coriaceous, acute and mucronate, 40–85 mm long, 2–3 (–3.5) mm wide, glabrous; longitudinal veins 3–5, ± not raised, widely spaced, central vein normally yellow and more evident than flanking brownish veins, lateral veins absent or few; gland (0.5–) 1–3 mm above pulvinus. Inflorescences 2-headed racemes; raceme axes (1–) 2–4 (–6) mm long; peduncles 5–8 mm long, normally glabrous; heads globular, 15–22-flowered, yellow; bracteoles 0.8–1 mm long, laminae acute to short-acuminate. Flowers 5-merous; sepals ± free and glabrous; petals ±glabrous. Pods narrowly oblong, 10–30 mm long, 3.5–5 mm wide, thinly coriaceous-crustaceous, straight to variously curved or sigmoid, often ±undulate, sparsely to densely short-pilose. Seeds longitudinal, normally obloid, 2.8–3.5 mm long; aril white.

Grows in undulating country along drainage lines within rocky terrain in loamy clay or red clay over granite or quartz diorite. Occurs in Mallee scrub dominated by various species Eucalyptus over a rather dense understory shrub stratum dominated by species of Melaleuca.