"Iris Cohen" wrote in message
...
Surely you jest. Can anyone identify a tree only from the thorns? What
does the
rest of the tree look like? I assume, since you are in Astralia, it is a
species of Acacia.
Iris,
Central NY, Zone 5a, Sunset Zone 40
"If we see light at the end of the tunnel, It's the light of the oncoming
train."
Robert Lowell (1917-1977)


I doubt that jocularity was the intent, but it does seem a daunting
challenge. Here in the Southland of the United States, we encounter a tree
that is referred to in the local vernacular as a "Thorny Locust". Wotever
its real name is unknown to me.

The *Thorny Locust* is a bane in more ways than one:

It provides scant shade; and alive and standing, it will strip you of your
hat, your shirt and the epidermis beneath if you even get close. The pricks
are not barbed, but each puncture and/or scratch results in a surly and sore
redness.

Cut down and stacked for pickup, the remaining feeder roots will spring
forth with a million tiny replicas of the tree proper. A landowner must
remain vigilant lest he find himself the attendant of more of the same than
he would care to claim.

Perhaps they, like University professors, were put here on earth as a test
of our mettle.

--Geno