Archidendron muellerianum, the Veiny Lace Flower, or Small-flower Laceflower is a rainforest

Rainforest

Rainforests are forests characterized by high rainfall, with definitions based on a minimum normal annual rainfall of 1750-2000 mm...

 tree with a restricted range in eastern Australia

Australia

Australia , officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country in the Southern Hemisphere comprising the mainland of the Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous smaller islands in the Indian and Pacific Oceans. It is the world's sixth-largest country by total area...

. It is a rare plant, with a ROTAP

ROTAP

Rare or Threatened Australian Plants, usually abbreviated to ROTAP, is a list of rare or threatened Australian plant taxa. Developed and maintained by the CSIRO, the most recent edition lists 5031 taxa. The list uses a binary coding system based on the IUCN Red List categories for "Presumed...

 rating of 3RCa

The tree was first described as Albizia muelleriana in 1896 by Joseph Maiden

Joseph Maiden

Joseph Henry Maiden was a botanist who made a major contribution to knowledge of the Australian flora, especially the Eucalyptus genus. This botanist is denoted by the author abbreviation Maiden when citing a botanical name.Joseph Maiden was born in St John's Wood, London...

 and Richard Thomas Baker

Richard Thomas Baker

Richard Thomas Baker was an Australian economic botanist, museum curator and educator.-Early life:Baker was born in Woolwich, England, son of Richard Thomas Baker, a blacksmith, and his wife Sarah, née Colkett...

, before being moved to its current binomial name by Nielsen. The specific epithet muelleriana honours the name of one of Australia's outstanding colonial botanists, Ferdinand Mueller.

Archidendron muellerianum grows as a tree up to 20 metres (70 ft) tall. The trunk has grey bark and can reach diameter of 60 cm (24 in), and is occasionally buttressed. The leaves are arranged alternately on the grey to red-brown branches and are bipinnate - made up of two leaf stalks each with several oval-shaped glossy leaflets, which measure 4–13 cm (1.6-5.2 in) long, and 2–5 cm (0.8-2 in) wide. The leaflets have prominent veins on both upper and undersurfaces. Appearing in November and December, the tiny white flowers are arranged in globular white flowerheads to 2.5 cm (1 in) in diameter. Flowering is followed by 10-13 cm (5-6.4 in) long wrinkled red-brown seed pods which ripen in April to December. Orange on the inside, they bear shiny black seeds.

It grows north from Alstonville, New South Wales

Alstonville, New South Wales

Alstonville is a town located in northern New South Wales, Australia, part of the region known as the Northern Rivers. Alstonville is located on the Bruxner Highway between the town of Ballina and city of Lismore . The village of Wollongbar is situated 4 km to the west of Alstonville...

 up to some of the remnant natural areas in the Gold Coast in south-eastern Queensland

Queensland

Queensland is a state of Australia, occupying the north-eastern section of the mainland continent. It is bordered by the Northern Territory, South Australia and New South Wales to the west, south-west and south respectively. To the east, Queensland is bordered by the Coral Sea and Pacific Ocean...

, in coastal or subtropical rainforest. The former habitat of seaside and sub tropical rainforest was mostly destroyed for agriculture and housing.