PlantFiles: Maypop, Purple Passion Flower, Passionflower, Apricot Vine
Passiflora incarnata

I was excited to plant this vine and see it flower and fruit in McLean, VA. Then, I saw it spread EVERYWHERE, year after year, despite removal of the vine. This plant is INVASIVE!

A vine started growing on my fence a couple of weeks ago. It bloomed and seems to be a maypop, but the flower is tiny-- about 2" across, and seldom opens all the way. It has fruit on it about half-way covered with a lacy loose-fitting covering. Today it has 2 flowers, still folded inward, and about 4 fruits. The largest one is about 1" long.

Is this the same thing I'm seeing here? It's in the shade, and has not been watered until today. If it's the same thing, maybe I should cut it down before it takes over!?

I planted a Passion Flower on a fence between our friends and our yard, it grew and bloomed. The next year, we couldn't find it, finally it showed up about 6 ft from the year
before. The following year, it was another 6ft away. MY DH and I fixed up a makeshift trellis for it. The original plants in
this place are Rose of Sharon. The passion vine has spread
all over them and we have a whole wall of their house covered in these 2 flowers. It is beautiful and we do it as a
joint effort.

Kay-phal (We are near Dearborn, MI)

Delicious fruit, very aromatic but with a strange aftertaste.

I live in southern part oh Ohio commonly referred to as appalachia Ohio. I purchased this plant two years ago at a local farmers market. I thought it would make a great addition to the garden along with my morning glories. And it was....the first year. It spreads like a virus!!!!!! It grows over everything, even the native Virginia Creeper vine has been overtaken! It's in the lawn, the shrubs, and in the eaves of my house!! It looks like I live in a jungle now. If I can't figure out how to control it next year I may just sign up for a house swap!!!

If its native it ain't invasive!
I tell myself this as I have just discovered these growing in our field by the zillions. lol

I saw this growing on our hill and was excited...my mom had one in a pot when I was a kid in Ohio. It was beautiful. I was amazed to find it back after the first and second winter. I thought I was seeing things as I didn't realize it grew on the edge of the woods so easly in this climate.

Well, it IS beautiful and unique but getting to be as invasive here as the honeysuckle in the south. Darn. It's growing up trees and spreading over anything! After the first 2 brush killer applications, we're getting something stronger and will keep killing sprouts.

I guess its fine IF you keep it in a pot!

In northern Arkansas this is considered a weed because it is so invasive. My husband thought it would be pretty to let it fill in an area we hadn't landscaped yet. It took over the side of the house, put out pods, reseeded and we have had to diligently dig out the seedlings. Only vinca can keep it under control. Our lower field is full of it. Please come and dig out all you want. I couldn't believe that people would actually buy this and have trouble growing it.

I bought two small pots of this at a greenhouse in Danielson CT-- I hope to train it up a trellis with a bench. I am planning to leave it in pots and cut it back/bring it in in the cold weather. I don't see anyone growing it in CT yet.

About fruit--The workers at the greenhouse had a different Passifora growing, with fruit. They told me that you can pollinate it yourself with a popsicle stick or a q tip and it will bear fruit. I have yet to try any of this. It is just on the kitchen window for now. So glad to hear it is so hardy!

Chillicothe,IL



I've had this plant in my yard for 14 years. It was here when we moved in. It took me a couple of years to figure out what it was.
I have it growing on the east side of my house-right next to the house. I have an arbor for it to climb on. Generally we try to control it-which is almost impossible to do. The last 2 years we have just let it go. It's covered the arbor,gone into the gutters & onto my roof. My husband realized a few years ago that it's really simple to train-just tie a string onto it & it will follow a string. I have some that we transplanted across the sidewalk & now grows up my garage. Of course there were a couple of stragglers that weren't where we wanted so he tied a string to it & it's now attached to the arbor.
We have loads of blooms & fruit on it this year-we counted the fruit today & there are at 60 on it. We attract alot of butterflies,bees,& hummingbirds with it.
I cut it back every fall & start watching in about May it comes back. Ours gets so out of control I give it away all summer. Seems like the more I give away the more it comes back! I've had people tell me that it won't grow here-or if it does it won't do well. That's when I bring them over here or whip out the pictures!
So any of you that are trying to grow it in IL-just be patient. Make sure it gets enough sun & not too much water. Mine gets full sun in the morning & has partial sun the rest of the day. I ignore it for the most part-no fertilizer & hardly ever water it. I've found that it's one of those plants that prefers to be ignored. Just make sure you give it lot of room-perfect fence cover.

Love the beautiful purple flowers. It attracts the Gulf Fritillary butterfly and the caterpillars love the leaves. It is fun to watch them grow big and fat and make chrysalises on the eaves of the house. I do not like the invasive nature of this vine. I started with one a bird nicely left the seed for and now have over 100 vines in the yard. Have to keep pulling them up or mowing them down to keep them in check. Very hard to get rid of.

Although we never tried to propagate this plant (my mother having a brown thumb), it grew wild all over Northeast Texas woods (near Louisiana) when I was a kid. It didn't show up every summer, we wouldn't see it at all if there was drought.

Started from seed and had 3 plants, Only good to zone 6 and since I live in five I thought I would take a chance and try it. Planted it close to the house and mulched it for the winter.
Really did not expect it to come back this year but to my amazement I now have 4 plants coming back. Flowers are beautiful and so is the fruit.never ate it though.

I first noticed this plant as a kid, some twenty-five years ago. It was at that time being cultivated by our neighbors eight houses down on their back fence. Since then it has spread several blocks in all directions, climbing over, through or around anything that it comes in contact with! It's really an amazing plant, nothing seems to stop it. It has completely covered all the fences in my back yard and is really very pretty to look at, especially in the Fall when at any on time there are several hundred flowers and fruits spread amongst the vines!

In 2005 I moved into this apartment and this vine kept growing all over the shrub, so I pulled it off. That is until it bloomed. Now the shrub is gone and I have vines everywhere. And around fifty fruit. I read where parts are poisonus. But are the fruits safe to eat? My daughter lives in Toledo Ohio and she has taken plants to her yard to share with her neighbors.

I found this vine in June & assumed that since I have many bird visitors to my yard, that was how it came to be. The leaves looked familiar to vines with beautiful flowers I've seen before, so I let it grow.
I was so excited when I saw the first flower & even more so when I saw a red seed pod! I didn't know if I should remove it yet, so I left it on the vine... bad move. After 2 weeks, there were only 2 seeds left & the pod was still red, so the next red pod was removed promptly & is now drying out on my counter.
Looking around my yard (jungle), I've found 3 more vines :)
I have to look for the flowers in the morning & early afternoon, as soon as the sun gets hot, they start closing.

The Maypop grows wild here but we don't have a problem with it being invasive. Insects are very attracted to it, so when I saw one come up in the flower bed near my Brugmansias I decided to leave it, to see if it would lure the insects away from the Brugs. I'll let you know.

My sis brought me a small piece of her P. Incarnata and told me to keep it in a pot for a couple of weeks before transplanting it. I finally put it in the ground a few weeks ago and, even though it is only about 8-12" tall, it has a bloom on it and six more buds! She also gave me a piece of her P. Constance Elliot which has grown a much larger vine, but has not put a single bud out.

This grows wild in Southern Arkansas, where much of my Mom's family comes from. That is where I got my start from. It is hardy in my zone 5a garden, but it does not bloom as much, and it does not produce fruit. I mainly grow it for the memory.

I remember playing with the fruit when I was little and visiting family in Arkansas; my Mom showed me how to put them together with sticks (like Tinker Toys) to make horses. I also remember my parents buying the herb in capsule form and giving it to me in the evening. YUK!!!

My information says it is hardy in zones 5-10. In cooler climates it is better planted against a south facing wall. Soaking seeds aids germination; it has a poor germination rate.

This plant grows wild around where I live. When kids we'd go pick the fruit and eat it. It was really quite good. Never tried to grow it. There are always plenty wild ones around.

I bought my house last Autumn in St. Catharines, Ontario, Canada (fairly close to Niagara Falls) at which time there was only one Passion Flower plant growing next to the front door—the previous owner said that it had been there for years. My wife pruned the plant back to ground level before the first snow.

Come spring, we had at least seven new plants springing up, some on the other side of a concrete stairway. Several of the plants grew all the way to the second-storey windows. We are rank beginner gardeners, and were so happy to see that our Passion Flowers took the initiative on their own.

Last year in 2004 we had a dry spring, so the Gulf Fritillaries were a little late in arriving, so we actually had some passion fruit to eat. I found the flavor very interesting, a little sour, but also sweet.

The year before that in 2003, my husband worried that the plants would become a problem by growing over everything. I told him to be patient, because the baby Fritilary caterpillars had already hatched. Sure enough, within two weeks there was nothing left but the larger vines. The caterpillars had eaten everything including much of the fruit. Later that summer and early fall, we had Fritilary butterflies that had hatched from our babies all over our gardens.

Some time back I posted on P. caerulea but wasn't sure that was what I had. It wasn't. It's P. incarnata and it was a volunteer. An invasive weed I had no time to tackle. Then, suddenly, just before a hurricane, it burst into bloom. Wow! The hurricane knocked off the blooms, but I've had a few more since. It's possible that the hurricane before that pushed it into bloom, since Hurricane 1 knocked down a couple of trees and the yard is sunnier.

It's volunteered on the NORTH side of my house, all along a brick wall, and another plant is trying to choke my pineapples, which I will not allow. And note that I'm getting blooms in late October. Maypop, huh?

Frankly, I think the hybrids--is that "Incense" a hybrid of incarnata?--are prettier than the species because they're more purple. Even so, the flowers are lovely, especially with all the gloom the hurricanes brought. Just haveta be sure not to take a long vacation. I could come back and find my whole house covered up.

Thanks to all of you who took pictures of that lovely "Incense." I think it would be dynamite teamed up with a pale-yellow climbing rose, like Marechal Niel or Double Yellow Lady Banks.

The Incarnata I have came from a filed at my brothers.
I loved the way it smelled and the flower was lovely.
I had to take a piece of it home that was 4 years ago and it has taken over in my side garden it goes where it wants it is huge.
It has done well every year and only gets better.
It is a bit invasive but that is why i like it so much .
I do have to keep it off the roses but it isn't hard to keep cut back.
I have it climbing and rambling it has grown from full sun to part sun and it dose just as well in part sun as it dose in full.
I don't have to do much to or for this plant it is hardy and easy to take care of in zone 7.
I cut it back after the first frost and cover the ground with a bail of hay .
Then in the spring it comes back and it spreads its self to a new part of the yard.
It climbs most anything it can get a tendril on it is on my apple trees and on my burning bush.
It is also on my TV antenna this vine is wonderfully for a cover on the front porch.
I have a trellis all around the porch and the vine has coverd it so you cant see if anyone is on the porch.

I really enjoy this vine. I have a Passiflora incarnata growing wildly on a trellis in my garden. The Passion Flower grows extrememly well here in zone 7a Murphysboro, Illinois. I live in extreme southern Illinois with average weather similiar to Tennessee. I have had P. incarnata growing here for only 2 years, which was started from roots a friend of mine gave to me. In that short time, this invasive, but ellegant vine has managed to grow 10 feet over the top of the trellis taking over my Chinese Porcelain Vine. It blooms from June to late September producing loads and loads of fruit. The fruit is about the size of a persons fist, with mostly air and seeds, but contains a sweet meat. Try to plant it out in your yard away from your house, because in hot summer weather, Passion Flower grows up to 3 inches per day! Runners which travel through the ground also pop-up randomly in my yard. Its not nearly invasive as the infamous Kudzu which grows around here, but you may find yourself mowing it down and trimming it back in peak summer heat!

If you have ever tasted the passion fruit, you know the taste is like nothing you have ever tasted before. Perfumey and acidic, but great to work with and adapt to recipes. wonderful in jellies, syrups and as an ingredient in pies, cakes, ice cream, pudding and wonderful addition to juices.

I like to freeze juice in cube trays to add to summer drinks and iced tea. After freezing, pop out of tray and store in zipper plastic bag in freezer...otherwise it will sort of start evaporating in a few days.

The inside of the fruit is hollow and smooth, but has many black seeds with juicy pulp clinging aound them. They have to be passed through a fine sieve or through layers of cheesecloth to extract juice. I have a friend that boils the pulp and seeds in a bit of water to loosen it up and then passes through a sieve. Easier than my method, but I prefer to use the pure juice in my recipes.

If anyone wants recipes using passion fruit or liliko'i, as we call them in Hawaii, please just drop me a note. I will be happy to share.

I just wanted to say how beautiful this flowering vine is!The fragrance is so nice.My great-grandmother planted this vine and had it a very long time,and it is still blooming today!I do have to say that each year it comes back in a slightly different spot!I love the symbolism of the crown of thorns that Jesus wore!(Missouri)

Just planted a passion flower vine a few weeks ago. Seems to be thriving as most things do in my area (San Francisco Bay Area, CA). My brother-in-law has one growing over his fence from the neighbor's yard. That's where I first saw the blooms. The structure and beauty of the blossom facinated me and I searched every nursery in the area to find one for myself. No fruit yet. Looking forward to that!

Although the vine has grown on the fence, which I wanted, I only get one beautiful flower at a time. However, there are many, many babies that never open. Am I doing something wrong? I live in hot and sunny Miami????

Regina

From the fruit I have made some very good jelly. Taste a bit like apple.

I grew this vine last year. It flowered amply but produced hollow fruit.

I unpotted it and planted in a protected place in the fall and it didn't come back this year.

Last year I purchased a small plant and the vine took off on a fence producing gorgeous flowers, but I don't know why I never saw any fruits on it at all? I cut back the vine and as of yet nothing has returned here near Atlanta in April. My mom had a wild passion flower growing a few years back, she cut back and it has never returned. Anyone who'd like to shed light on this plant is encouraged to write me Sasby@comcast.net. Thanks!

When I was a child growing up in northwest Indiana (U.S.), we had a gorgeous passion vine that returned each year to grow up our chimney. I still live in Zone 5 and have tried several times to get one to winter well in this area. Its beauty is breathtaking - I can't give up!

We found Purple Passion Flower plants while fencing property in Cleveland, Texas (U.S.) Such a beautiful flower with an unforgettable smell - now among one of my personal favorites and a new challenge to get to grow closer to the new house. (Wish us luck!)

This plant grows wild in my son's back yard near Atlanta, Georgia (zone 7b) but is somewhat in the shade of large trees, so it rarely flowers. It just rambles among the native ferns and tangles of blackberries.

In the late 1980's I found this plant growing on a chainlink fence at my former home in St. Petersburg, Florida (zone 9b), and it was always quite attractive if we got enough rain. I never really watered or fertilized it, as it was in a utility part of the yard behind a shed, but it survived quite nicely. Something--birds, squirrels or kids--always got to the fruit before I did, and what fruit I saw was always quite small. For people there are many other varieties of passionflower that have larger fruit. But this species is great for wildlife, especially as a food and nectar source for Gulf Fritillary butterflies.

Maypop plants grow here in Hamburg, Arkansas (U.S.) It is growing on my sister's fencerow, and on the side of the road. This is a very beautiful plant--the blossoms are so exotic and unique!! I am going to get seeds from my sister and try to plant some in my yard.

My children actually planted this plant by mistake by throwing a passion fruit down outside. The next year I noticed a beautiful vine with unusual flowers growing there. Since then we have transplanted and planted seeds to make beautiful Passiflora incarnata vines in several places in our yard. Now we are sharing them with friends.

Although this plant has become very invasive in my yard I am not willing to completely remove it. It is host plant for the Gulf Fritillary Butterfly; the first year it bloomed we had hundreds of butterflies in our yard. The activity was spectacular. The sweet scent of the blooms is an especially appreciated bonus.

I like this plant very much, but here in central Alabama (U.S.) it is difficult to contain; in fact, it could be considered invasive under normal conditions.

It has fruit now and still blooming. I think I will try it in a container and see how that works.

I have grown this purple passion vine for several years and I have never seen any fruit.

I have had "Purple Passion Vine" for several years now and I have never seen the fruit. I am amazed!

I brought a small piece of a root back from a trip to Atlanta. It took off and grew beautifully. When we moved to our new house, we dug up the roots and now have one growing here. I have it climbing along a fence, but think I would like to try it in a huge pot so I can contain it somewhat.

It is very much a noxious weed in West, TN but a very beatiful one! Plant it in a lrg. pot, bury the pot and cut All seed pod off and you should give you much pleasure for years.

According to legend, the elaborate floral structure of a
Passion Flower is similar to the elements of the Passion
or Crucifixion of Christ:

The 5 petals and 5 sepals are the 10 Apostles (omitting
Peter and Judas).
The 3 pistils (or styles) are the nails of the Cross;
The corona (or filaments) at the top of the flower is
the Crown of Thorns,
The 5 anthers are the 5 wounds,
The stemmed ovary is the Lord's Goblet.

Of over 460 known species of Passiflora, only one is
native to the US, Passiflora incarnata, known also as
Maypop.

Wild, invasive and virtually indestructible, I found
hundreds of them of varying lengths and sizes in the
woods next to a Park in Rockledge, Florida(32955). These photos were taken in diffused but very low natural light
in late afternoon.

Our "Maypop" ("Purple Passion") plant just appeared one day along the base of our foundation. It grew and grew so we got a large trellis for it. It has grown over and above the trellis and is to the roofline. It has flowers everywhere and is just beautiful. We also have several fruit this year. It is manageable with a trellis, but not without.

This is considered to be the only zone 7 hardy passiflora to produce edible fruit. Where I live, in East Tennessee, it is native and considered by some to be a weed.