Aspalathus hirta E.Mey.

An erect, branched shrub 0.8-2 m tall with short-tomentose to villous branches with semiglobose, pubescent short-shoot tubercles. Leaflets needle-like, 5-12(-15) mm long, straight, terete or slightly angular, rigid, green, glabrous (or almost so), ending in an apical, sharp spinelet often longer than 1 mm. Inflorescences unifloral, on lateral short-shoots, or solitary or in pairs on very short lateral branchlets, often several to numerous on each branch. Bract subulate or acicular, 0.7-4.5 mm long. Calyx tube short, campanulate, 3-4 mm long, short-tomentose (or smoothly puberulous) to short-villous; lobes triangular-subulate, 1.7-5(-7) mm long, narrowing abruptly into a sharp spinelet (subsp. hirta) or linear-subulate with a distinct vein (subsp. stellaris). Petals bright yellow. Standard blade circular or obovate, 9-13.5 x 9-13 mm, short-sericeous or tomentose on the back, glabrous or marginally puberulous on the front. Wing petals narrowly elliptic-oblong, 7-11 x 2.5-4 mm, glabrous. Keel blades lunate, 7-11 x 3-4 mm, obtuse, glabrous (rarely partly pubescent); upper margin slightly concave. Pistil with tomentose ovary and style base; ovules 2 (rarely 3 or 4). Pod broadly lanceolate, 11-13.5 x 4-5.2 mm, densely woolly or (subsp. stellaris) sericeous.