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Pollinators and passers-by love passion flowers

By JANE WEBER
Published October 16, 2006

Passion flower, Passiflora species, has the most unusual flower in my garden. Four to 7 inches in diameter, this showy, bright purple, prolific bloomer fascinates most visitors who have never seen so strange a bloom.

Five petals backed by five similarly colored sepals radiate from a central hub. Sounds normal so far. Atop these are inner and outer coronas of about 100 fine, kinky hairlike filaments that surround five conspicuous stamens with hinged white anthers and stalked ovaries.

Each flower opens midmorning, attracts many pollinators, then fades by evening. I pick them from their tendril-climbing vine that clambers amid my 12-foot tall crape myrtle tree so guests can take a close look.

The combination of watermelon red crape flowers draped with a cascade of purple passion flowers intrigues Red Hat Society ladies.

From July to September, I bend over the myrtle branches to snip off spent blooms of both species so they won't set seed and will bloom longer and more prolifically. When the crape myrtle goes dormant for the winter, its companion dies back to the ground.

By late spring, hardy, locally grown passion flowers are big enough to sell and plant. Cost is about $3 for a 6-inch pot or $8 for a 10-inch pot at smaller grower nurseries. Big outlets rarely carry passion vines: any plant on a stake takes too much space to truck.

Though I let some fruit set for the wildlife and to harvest seed, the 2-inch-wide green berry that turns yellow at maturity is unpalatable to humans. Edible passion fruit, Passiflora edulis, is a tropical American vine from Zones 10 to 12. It will not recover from the 10 to 20 frosty nights that chill Citrus County each winter.

All passion vines spread by underground, far reaching runners. It's fun to discover where they pop up in spring and move a tuteur, arched arbor or trellis for them to climb.

Florida boasts three native species from more than 400 members of this pan-American genus

Maypop, Passiflora incarnata, is the more common, widespread one hardy from Zone 7 to 10. It ranges south of the Ohio River through most of Florida and the southeastern United States. Its leaves have toothed margins and long stems (petioles) that sport two tiny, golden-brown nectar glands. Its lavender to whitish flowers are less flamboyant than the purple passion vine, P. incense, scrambling around my garden. This hybrid is a noninvasive but rambunctious cross between our native P. incarnata and a Mexican species. It has large five-fingered leaves.

Corky stem passion flower, P. suberosa, occurs naturally in the southern two thirds of Florida. It has much smaller greenish flowers and lance-shaped leaves with nectar glands on the petioles. Yellow passion flower, P. lutea, has unlobed to broadly rounded, three-lobed, alternate leaves without nectar glands and a small black berry.

All passion flowers are eaten by caterpillars of Gulf Fritillary, Julia Heliconia and Zebra Heliconia (our long-winged state butterfly). Photos of passion flowers and the larvae are featured in Marc Minno's Florida Butterfly Caterpillars and Their Host Plants, available from the library.

Please do not plant the red passion flowers from Brazil, as I'm told they have toxins that kill the caterpillars before they pupate.

For information, contact Chris Small at 527-8629.

Beverly Hills Butterfly Club meets at 2:30 p.m. on the second Sunday of the month at the Beverly Hills Recreation Association, 77 Civic Circle.

Editor's note: This weekly article is provided by Jane Weber, professional gardener, grower, consultant, designer and environmentalist. Visit her Certified Florida Yard and Backyard Wildlife Habitat, 5019 W Stargazer Lane, Dunnellon. Call (352) 465-0649.

[Last modified October 16, 2006, 01:26:23]