Australian Bluebell

Billardiera fusiformis is a sturdy, shrubby climber, its new stems greenish and shaggy hairy, later reddish-brown. Its adult leaves are linear to narrowly elliptic, 25–50 mm (0.98–1.97 in) long, 2–6 mm (0.079–0.236 in) wide and sessile. Both surfaces of the leaves are softly-hairy, but become glabrous with age. The flowers are arranged singly or in groups of up to four on a rachis 10–15 mm (0.39–0.59 in) long, each flower on a nodding pedicel 6–10 mm (0.24–0.39 in) long. The sepals are silky hairy, 2–3 mm (0.079–0.118 in) long and fall off as the flower develops. The petals are blue, white or pink, 5–11 mm (0.20–0.43 in) long, about 3 mm (0.12 in) wide and free from each other. Flowering occurs in late spring and summer, and the mature fruit is a green, spindle-shaped berry 20–25 mm (0.79–0.98 in) long that turns purplish as it ages. Billardiera fusiformis can be distinguished from others in the genus by its narrowly elliptic, almost sessile leaves, its deep blue, white or pink petals that are free from each other and the anthers that are nearly twice as long as their filaments and are fused to each other at first, later free.

Australian bluebell was originally endemic to the south-west of Western Australia where it grew in coastal and mallee heath in the Avon Wheatbelt, Coolgardie, Esperance Plains, Jarrah Forest, Mallee, Swan Coastal Plain and Warren bioregions. Horticultural use in other states, especially of the white and pink forms of the species, has allowed the species to be naturalised in other states, but the species does not appear to be as weedy as the similar B. heterophylla.