Passiflora edulis Passion Flower PFAF Plant Database

2 New Books ** Edible Plants: An inspirational guide to choosing and growing unusual edible plants and Woodland Gardening (Forest) [Paperback]. more >>


Search Page Content

Passiflora edulis - Sims.f.

Common Name

Passion Flower

Family

Passifloraceae

Synonyms

Known Hazards

None known

Habitats

Not known

Range

S. America - Brazil, Paraguay and northern Argentina.

Edibility Rating

Medicinal Rating

Care

Summary

Physical Characteristics

Passiflora edulis is an evergreen Climber growing to 9 m (29ft 6in) at a fast rate.
It is hardy to zone 10 and is frost tender. It is in leaf 12-Jan It is in flower from Jul to August. The flowers are hermaphrodite (have both male and female organs) and are pollinated by Bees.

Suitable for: light (sandy), medium (loamy) and heavy (clay) soils and prefers well-drained soil. Suitable pH: acid, neutral and basic (alkaline) soils. It cannot grow in the shade. It prefers moist soil.




http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/User:Fibonacci

Habitats
South Wall. By. West Wall. By.

Edible Uses

Edible Parts: Fruit; Oil.
Edible Uses: Oil.

Fruit - raw or cooked. An agreeable cooling taste[2, 3, 46, 171], somewhat like an orange with a mixture of acid[4]. The ripe aromatic fruit is allowed to wrinkle and develop sweetness, it is then eaten raw, juiced, made into a syrup or used in sauces, cakes etc[183]. The fruit is about 5cm in diameter[200]. An edible oil is obtained from the seed[183].

Medicinal Uses
Plants For A Future can not take any responsibility for any adverse effects from the use of plants. Always seek advice from a professional before using a plant medicinally. Stimulant; Tonic. The pulp of the fruit is stimulant and tonic[240].

Other Uses
Oil. None known

Cultivation details

Requires a well-drained soil with plenty of moisture in the growing season, otherwise it is not fussy[1, 3]. Plants are not very frost tolerant and are best grown in a greenhouse[3]. However, the roots are somewhat hardier and can survive the winter outdoors in many areas of Britain if the soil is prevented from freezing[88]. If plants are cut down to the ground by frost they can regenerate from the base[200]. There is also the possibility of growing plants on rootstocks of P. caerulea which might make them hardier[200]. This species is often cultivated in warmer climes than Britain for its edible fruit, there are some named varieties[46, 183]. The fruit can be freely produced in Britain in hot summers[166]. Roots of outdoor grown plants should be restricted to encourage fruiting[1]. Any pruning is best carried out in the spring[219]. If fruit is required it is best to hand pollinate, using pollen from a flower that has been open for 12 hours to pollinate a newly opened flower before midday[88, 200]. The flowers open in sunny weather and do not open on dull cloudy days[219]. The flowers have the scent of heliotropes[245]. A climbing plant, attaching itself to other plants by means of tendrils that are produced at the leaf axils. Plants in this genus are notably resistant to honey fungus[200].

Propagation

Pre-soak the seed for 12 hours in warm water and then sow late winter or early spring in a warm greenhouse. If sown in January and grown on fast it can flower and fruit in its first year[88]. The seed germinates in 1 - 12 months at 20°c. Prick out the seedlings into individual pots when they are large enough to handle. It you are intending to grow the plants outdoors, it is probably best to keep them in the greenhouse for their first winter and plant them out into their permanent positions in late spring or early summer, after the last expected frosts. Mulch the roots well in late autumn to protect them from the cold. Cuttings of young shoots, 15cm with a heel, in spring[1]. Leaf bud cuttings in spring. Cuttings of fully mature wood in early summer. Takes 3 months. High percentage[3].

Plant Suppliers: Click here for a List

You can download this page as a PDF

Expert comment

Author
Sims.f.

Botanical References
200

Links / References

[1]F. Chittendon. RHS Dictionary of Plants plus Supplement. 1956

Comprehensive listing of species and how to grow them. Somewhat outdated, it has been replaces in 1992 by a new dictionary (see [200]).

[2]Hedrick. U. P. Sturtevant's Edible Plants of the World.

Lots of entries, quite a lot of information in most entries and references.

[3]Simmons. A. E. Growing Unusual Fruit.

A very readable book with information on about 100 species that can be grown in Britain (some in greenhouses) and details on how to grow and use them.

[4]Grieve. A Modern Herbal.

Not so modern (1930's?) but lots of information, mainly temperate plants.

[46]Uphof. J. C. Th. Dictionary of Economic Plants.

An excellent and very comprehensive guide but it only gives very short descriptions of the uses without any details of how to utilize the plants. Not for the casual reader.

[88]RHS. The Garden. Volume 112.

Snippets of information from the magazine of the RHS. In particular, there are articles on plants that are resistant to honey fungus, oriental vegetables, Cimicifuga spp, Passiflora species and Cucurbits.

[166]Taylor. J. The Milder Garden.

A good book on plants that you didn't know could be grown outdoors in Britain.

[171]Hill. A. F. Economic Botany.

Not very comprehensive, but it is quite readable and goes into some a bit of detail about the plants it does cover.

[183]Facciola. S. Cornucopia - A Source Book of Edible Plants.

Excellent. Contains a very wide range of conventional and unconventional food plants (including tropical) and where they can be obtained (mainly N. American nurseries but also research institutes and a lot of other nurseries from around the world.

[200]Huxley. A. The New RHS Dictionary of Gardening. 1992.

Excellent and very comprehensive, though it contains a number of silly mistakes. Readable yet also very detailed.

[219]Grey-Wilson. C. & Matthews. V. Gardening on Walls

A nice little book about plants for growing against walls and a small section on plants that can grow in walls.

[240]Chopra. R. N., Nayar. S. L. and Chopra. I. C. Glossary of Indian Medicinal Plants (Including the Supplement).

Very terse details of medicinal uses of plants with a wide range of references and details of research into the plants chemistry. Not for the casual reader.

[245]Genders. R. Scented Flora of the World.

An excellent, comprehensive book on scented plants giving a few other plant uses and brief cultivation details. There are no illustrations.

Readers comment

Elizabeth H.
joohn lepcha	Tue Jun 22 11:20:49 2004

I liked it becouse I myself is passion fruit grower from india

Elizabeth H.
Spidra Webster	Tue Oct 9 2007

An edibility rating of 2?? This is one of the most edible passiflora fruits. It's grown commercially for its juice.

QR Code

What's this?

This is a QR code (short for Quick Response) which gives fast-track access to our website pages. QR Codes are barcodes that can be read by mobile phone (smartphone) cameras. This QR Code is unique to this page. All plant pages have their own unique code. For more information about QR Codes click here.

1. Copy and print the QR code to a plant label, poster, book, website, magazines, newspaper etc and even t-shirts.

2. Smartphone users scan the QR Code which automatically takes them to the webpage the QR Code came from.

3. Smartphone users quickly have information on a plant directly for the pfaf.org website on their phone.

Rate This Plant
Please rate this plants for how successful you have found it to be. You will need to be logged in to do this. Our intention is not to create a list of 'popular' plants but rather to highlight plants that may be rare and unusual and that have been found to be useful by website users. This hopefully will encourage more people to use plants that they possibly would not have considered before.

Add a comment/link

If you have important information about this plant that may help other users please add a comment or link below. Only comments or links that are felt to be directly relevant to a plant will be included. If you think a comment/link or information contained on this page is inaccurate or misleading we would welcome your feedback at admin@pfaf.org. If you have questions about a plant please use the Forum on this website as we do not have the resources to answer questions ourselves.

* Please note: the comments by website users are not necessarily those held by PFAF and may give misleading or inaccurate information.

Subject : Passiflora edulis

Links	To add a link to another website with useful info add the details here
Name of Site
URL of Site
Details