Growing a passion fruit vine in Seattle

If you are a long time follower, you know by now that I LOVE passion fruit.  I’m not sure if it’s my favorite fruit (hello ripe mango,) but it’s definitely one of my favorites.  I would buy it from an Asian store here in Seattle, but they are like $3 a pop and look old and withered.  I had given up on trying to buy it from the store here in the US.

Anyhow, last summer, one of my reader’s posted an IG photo of a passion fruit flower he was growing in Florida.  I was taken aback since that was the first time I’ve seen it on a plant.  I asked him more about it and did some research and it turns out that it should do pretty well in the South.  The only problem was that I don’t live in the South; I live in Seattle, which means it probably won’t grow here.  Of course my Viet gambling blood has to prove them wrong and will grow one here anyway!

I knew nurseries here wouldn’t have it, so of course I went on to Amazon and bought it from 2 people:

• Seller A – DON’T BUY from this seller.  It took him over a week to ship and the 2 plants came with A SINGLE LEAF EACH!  Needless to say, they aren’t doing well.
• Seller B – I bought from this seller as well since I wanted a more “frost hardy” version since I live in Seattle.  This one arrived in 2 days USPS  Priority and this is how it arrived on March 10th

I then put it into an 8 inch pot and put it by the windowsill.  This is April 3rd, so 3.5 weeks later:

Then yesterday, I repotted it into it’s “final” pot and here we are now:

My plan for growing this thing

I’ve talked this through with some gardening coworkers already.  I have 2 options come this winter – I can either trim it down to about 3 feet and take it inside for the winter, or I can try to keep it outside and try to cover the pot to keep it warm.  I’m leaning towards #2 since a) this variety is supposed to be “cold hardy” and b) I worry that if I cut it down to 3 feet, I’ll be back where I am now come next Spring, which means I’ll have to wait another year before it fruits.  If it somehow can stay alive through this winter, then I HOPEFULLY can have fruit by next Summer (up to 50 fruit per vine.)

Also, I plan on letting it vine across my patio when I put it outside.  The tomato stake is there for it to grow upwards towards the patio railing.  Will it survive?  Will it die?  I don’t know, but I’m going to try to keep it alive.