Erythrophleum chlorostachys

Erythrophleum chlorostachys, the Cooktown ironwood or northern ironwood, is a semi-deciduous leguminous tree of the family Fabaceae endemic to tropical northern Australia, occurring from north-east Queensland across the Top End to the Kimberley of Western Australia. It reaches 10-20 m in height with a dense, spreading crown, the trunk clothed in dark grey, longitudinally fissured bark. Adapted to a strongly seasonal monsoon climate, the tree drops much of its bipinnate, dark-green foliage in response to the long winter dry season. Small, creamy-yellow flowers are produced on slender axillary spikes during the build-up to the wet, and develop into flat, leathery, oblong legume pods. The heartwood is exceptionally hard, dense and termite-resistant. The foliage contains cytotoxic diterpenoid alkaloids and is highly poisonous to introduced livestock; deaths of cattle and horses are well documented across its range.