Floral Emblems of Australia Australian National Botanic Gardens Australian National Herbarium

The first granting of armorial bearings to the Commonwealth of Australia was made in 1908. A new design was granted by Royal Warrant on 19 September 1912. The branches of wattle used as an ornamental accessory to the shield, representing the badges of the six States as they were in 1912, were not mentioned in the blazon, but were depicted in the coloured illustration included in the gazettal of the Australian armorial bearings. There are conventional versions of the bearings for formal printing and other formal media. The wattle depicted has clusters of spherical flowerheads coloured yellow and blue-grey, and green phyllodes characteristic of many species of Acacia. It is not a botanically accurate representation of A. pycnantha. Stylised versions are also used:

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