PlantNET Home DONATE TODAY | PlantNET Home | Search NSW Flora | Contact Us  
FloraOnline
Introduction
Plant Name Search
Index Search
Spatial Search
Identification Keys
Classification
Glossary
WeedAlert
Telopea Journal
Other Data Sources
NEW SOUTH WALES FLORA ONLINE Printable Page

Genus Billardiera Family Pittosporaceae

Synonyms: Sollya APNI*

Description: Undershrubs or perennial climbers or scramblers or with twining branches up to a few metres long.

Leaves alternate, elliptic, lanceolate or linear-oblong, margins entire, flat or occasionally sinuate.

Flowers solitary or in terminal cymes, pedicellate, greenish yellow to cream or purple or rarely blue. Sepals free. Petals coherent to above the middle, spreading above. Stamens free; anthers oblong or ovate, shorter than the filaments. Ovary ± sessile, glabrous or pubescent, 1- or 2-locular.

Fruit a succulent or fleshy-fibrous oblong-ovoid berry; seeds ovoid, reniform or globose, often enveloped in a mucilaginous pulp.


Distribution and occurrence: World: c. 9 species, endemic Australia. Australia: all States except N.T.

Text by R. O. Makinson
Taxon concept:

Taxa not yet included in identification key
Billardiera fusiformis

 Key to the species 
1Inflorescences simple, corymbs with up to 10 flowersBillardiera heterophylla
Inflorescences usually with 3 or fewer flowers, rarely corymbose2
2Inflorescences sessile, flowers not pendent, sepals thickened at the baseBillardiera versicolor
Inflorescence not sessile, flowers pendent, sepals not thickened at base
                       Back to 1
3
3Petals persisting, fruit unilocular with a thin spongy pericarp, ovate; seeds freeBillardiera macrantha
Petals only briefly cohering; fruit bilocular, cylindrical with a green-purple thick skin over a fleshy or pithy mesocarp enclosing seeds
                       Back to 2
4
4Petals green-yellow, sometimes with dark blue or purple contrast spots; fruit true berries with seeds difficult to separate from surrounding fleshBillardiera mutabilis
Petals initially yellow, becoming pink mauve or red with age; fruit berry-like but with seeds in separate dry compartments
                       Back to 3
5
5Twinner with flowers noticably pendent on slender stalks, petals becoming tinged red with ageBillardiera rubens
Shrubs, mainly erect, eventually scandent; flowers barely nodding, becoming pink with age
                       Back to 4
Billardiera scandens

  Privacy | Copyright | Disclaimer | About PlantNET | Cite PlantNET