Billardiera speciosa

Billardiera speciosa is a species of flowering plant in the family Pittosporaceae and is endemic to southern Western Australia. It is a slender climber that grows in coastal heath and has narrowly elliptic leaves with the edges rolled under and groups of purple or mauve flowers.

Description

Billardiera speciosa is slender climber that has sessile, narrowly elliptic leaves long, about wide and often in clusters. The edges of the leaves are rolled under and there is a small point on th tip. The flowers are arranged in groups with bracts long at the base. The sepals are green, hairy and long and the petals are spatula-shaped, purple or mauve, long, and fade as they age. Flowering occurs in February.

Taxonomy

This species was first formally described in 1837 by Stephan Endlicher who gave it the name Pronaya speciosa in Enumeratio plantarum quas in Novae Hollandiae ora austro-occidentali ad fluvium Cygnorum et in sinu Regis Georgii collegit Carolus Liber Baro de Hügel from an unpublished description by Charles von Hügel of a specimen collected by Ferdinand Bauer near King George Sound. In1862, Ferdinand von Mueller transferred the species to the genus Billardiera in The Plants Indigenous to the Colony of Victoria. The specific epithet means "showy".

Distribution and habitat

Billardiera speciosa grows in coastal heath on limestone between East Mount Barren and Duke of Orleans Bay in the Esperance Plains bioregions of southern Western Australia.