Photo: Forest and Kim Starr — CC BY 3.0 us · source
Survives zone 8 through 9
Harvest calendar
Best planted in early spring after your last frost, or in fall before the ground freezes, depending on your climate.
Ornamental passionflower — fruit small and largely insipid. Care: Winter protection — mulch, fleece, or a warm wall.
- Hardiness
- Zone 8–9
- Habit
- Vine
- Edible part
- Flower, Fruit
- Ripens
- Late summer–autumn
- Mature size
- Vigorous vine 5–10 m; tender — container or greenhouse in cool climates
- Light
- Full sun
- Soil pH
- 6.0–7.0
- Environment
- Montane
- Native range
- The tropical Andes — cloud forest and upland valleys in Venezuela, Colombia, Ecuador and Peru at roughly 2,000–3,000 m; Kew's World Checklist also gives southern Mexico and Guatemala as native, and treats the Bolivian populations as introduced. ⚠ Seriously invasive in Hawaii and New Zealand, where it smothers native forest, and naturalised in Australia, Guam and Zimbabwe.
- Status
- Cultivated
- Years to fruit
- 1–3 yrs
- Growth speed
- 4–8 m/year — very fast, reaching 10 m and blanketing whatever it climbs.
- Spacing
- 300 cm (118 in) apart — about 9 m² (97 sq ft) per plant
- Leaf shape
- Alternate, deeply 3-lobed and softly hairy on both faces, giving the whole vine a downy grey-green look.
- Root system
- Shallow, fibrous and wide-spreading, with stems rooting where they run along the ground — a large part of why infestations are so hard to clear.
- Fruit description
- Oblong deep-yellow to light-orange fruits 10–14 cm long by 3.5–4.5 cm wide, tapering at both ends like a short straight banana; aromatic orange pulp, sweet-tart and excellent in juice and desserts.
- Propagation
- Seed germinates in 2–4 weeks from fresh, scarified seed. Semi-ripe stem cuttings of non-flowering shoots taken in late spring or summer root under cover; layering works too, since trailing stems root where they touch.
- Pollination
- Insect- and bird-pollinated in its Andean range, where long-billed hummingbirds reach the deep floral tube. Outside that range fruit set is often poor without hand-pollination — though where it has naturalised it clearly sets seed freely enough to become invasive.
The edible parts listed above are a starting point, not a field guide. Identify a plant with certainty — ideally against a local authority — before eating any part of it, and read the full disclaimer. Spotted something wrong? Report it.
Growing guide
Fertilizing. Fast-growing vine with a fairly heavy appetite in the growing season — feed monthly with a balanced fertilizer; excess nitrogen produces lush foliage at the expense of flowering and fruit.
How it spreads. Vigorous climber spread by bird-dispersed seed; in mild, humid climates (notably Hawaii, and in parts of its native Andes) it has become a serious invasive that smothers canopy trees, so self-seeding shouldn't be assumed harmless even in a cooler garden.
Growing tips. Needs a sturdy trellis or wall to climb; top growth is frost-tender, so winter protection (mulch, fleece, or a warm wall) is needed at the cold end of its range; prune after flowering to keep size in check and encourage new flowering wood.
Grow journal
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