Quite a long time ago, I ordered seeds (from chileflora, no idea how respectable they are) of "Passiflora tripartita". I was a bit of a dilettante with passifloras then and only two sprouted and just one survived until now.
Anyway, I now have a beautiful passiflora that survives Belgian winters (in the city, and in a pot that I could always bring inside if it was too cold) but none of the flowers ever set fruit, even with an apparently sufficient supply of bees, and with my attempted manual pollination.
From what I can read, most sources (like https://www.cabi.org/isc/datasheet/38802 (https://www.cabi.org/isc/datasheet/38802)) seem to say that Passiflora tripartita var. molissima can self-pollinate (though it can likely not be pollinated by the Passiflora cerulea that are common around me in the city) so having just one should not be a problem.
Now, that leads me to my question: my seeds were just labelled as "Passiflora tripartita", no variety mentioned. The webshop is still here after How do I know if it's var. molissima (which seems by far the most common) or not?
Here's a picture I took of a flower last year when it really started taking off:
(https://seos.fr/blog/images/passiflore.jpg)
I have another question, I'd like to share it with my dad who lives in Western France where it should grow just fine, but I have never, not once, managed to root any cutting from it. Unlike my other passifloras, this one seems to be very recalcitrant, and it doesn't make any shoots from its roots either. Any suggestions? They also aren't graft compatible (or not very) with P. cerulea so that's not an option either.
Much more beautiful than regular passiflora. How does the fruit taste?
It's supposed to taste good, but obviously since mine doesn't set fruit I can't really tell. The flowers are nice, but since they are hanging down they're much less conspicuous than P. cerulea or the other more common species unless you're looking up.
As far as I remember, it started flowering when it was three years old, the two first years were spent without a support though (hanging down from a ledge) and I've noticed that a support is a strong signal to induce flowering. Flowers seem to almost only develop on nodes where tendrils have started wrapping around something, and almost immediately do.
The leaves it makes have always been rather large, about 10 centimeters long and wide. The seedlings make tiny leaves at first, but they soon become larger.
About rooting, as I said I have no problem rooting the other species I have, but this one doesn't root in any condition that I've tried. With hormone or not (although I've only tried IBA yet), in hot, warm or cool conditions, sun or shade, water, sand or dirt. Two stems of the plant have been buried under dirt for six months now in an attempt at layering and although they grow vigorously, they have not rooted either.
I've also found this paper https://www.researchgate.net/publication/347766110_Rooting_Response_of_Seven_Passion_Fruit_Species_to_Basal_Application_of_Auxin (https://www.researchgate.net/publication/347766110_Rooting_Response_of_Seven_Passion_Fruit_Species_to_Basal_Application_of_Auxin) that says:
No roots formed in the cuttings of banana passion fruit for any treatment. Therefore, no data were collected for percent rooting, root number, average root length, and root dry weight. Although some cuttings were completely dead, others had callused, which could have led to the possible formation of roots, had the cuttings been left longer than 30 d.
Which matches my experience: I've had cuttings heal nicely and stay alive for months without developing roots, until they eventually die of course.
This is a seedling that was labeled "Passiflora tripartita":
(https://seos.fr/blog/images/passiflora-tripartita-2-mois.jpg)
And these are seedlings that were labeled "Passiflora tripartita var. molissima", the germination rate was quite good with them:
(https://seos.fr/blog/images/passiflora-tripartita-var-molissima-germination.jpg)