Vachellia stuhlmannii (Taub.) Kyal. & Boatwr.

Obconical shrub to 2.5 m high, branching from the base. Bark olive-to dark reddish-brown; young shoots with spreading golden villous hairs 1.5-3 mm long, hairs later going greyish-white; branchlets olive-to reddish-brown, longitudinally wrinkled, with large yellowish somewhat transversely elongated lenticels, becoming glabrescent with age. Stipules spinescent, in pairs, 0.7-6.5 cm long, straight or slightly deflexed, sparingly to densely pubescent especially basally, becoming glabrescent with age; 'ant-galls' and other prickles absent. Leaves sparingly to densely clothed with spreading whitish hairs: petiole 0.3-1 cm long, adaxial gland usually present on primary leaves but absent from secondary leaves; rhachis 2-5.5(7.5) cm long, a gland often at the junction of the top 1-3 pinnae pairs or absent; pinnae 4-12 pairs (occasionally leaves on juvenile non-flowering shoots may have up to 17 pairs of pinnae and rhachides up to 9 cm long); rhachillae 1.1-1.9 cm long; leaflets 6-15 pairs per pinna, 2-5.5 x 0.6-1.5 mm, linear-oblong, apex subacute to acute, glabrous beneath, margins usually with appressed or spreading cilia. Inflorescences capitate, on axillary peduncles, fascicled or solitary, usually produced before the leaves. Flowers white, sessile; peduncles 0.6-1.6 cm long, densely hairy or tomentose, eglandular; involucel basal or in lower half of the peduncle, up to 3 mm long. Calyx sparingly to densely pubescent apically, tube 1.6-2.2 mm long, lobes up to 0.4 mm long. Corolla sparingly to densely pubescent apically, tube 2.2-3.2 mm long, lobes up to 0.5 mm long. Stamen-filaments free, up to 6 mm long; anthers with a deciduous apical gland. Ovary up to 1.4 mm long, sessile or very shortly stipitate. Pods dark grey-brown to black, densely clothed with long spreading greyish-white hairs, 2.2-6.5 x (0.9)1.1-2.2 cm, straight or somewhat curved, fibrous, indehiscent, usually much attenuate basally, the stipe up to 2 cm long. Seeds olive, 4.5-9 mm in diam., ellipsoid to subglobose, minutely punctate; areole 4-6 x 2.5-4.5 mm, often indistinct.