Calicotome
Medium to tall perennial shrubs; stems well-branched, spinescent. Leaves alternate, palmately trifoliolate, petiolate; stipules absent or small (in Victoria). Flowers borne singly or in clusters, in upper axils or terminal; bracteole broad, tripartite, at apex of pedicels; calyx turbinate, obscurely 5-toothed, membranous, teeth short, apices breaking away as flower opens leaving cup-like remnant; petals yellow; standard ovate, erect, longer than other petals; wings obovate-oblong; keel blunt, incurved; stamens monadelphous, anthers alternately long and short; ovary sessile, style incurved, glabrous, stigma capitate, oblique, ovules 2 or more. Pod narrow linear-oblong, compressed, dehiscent; seeds several, arillate.
2 species, from Europe, the Middle East and northern Africa; 1 species naturalised in Australia.
Jeanes, J.A. (1996). Fabaceae. In: Walsh, N.G.; Entwisle, T.J., Flora of Victoria Vol. 3, Dicotyledons Winteraceae to Myrtaceae, pp. 663–829. Inkata Press, Melbourne.
Spinning