Someone please help. I'm new to passifloras and have a blue caerulea and a violet one like mjsponies posted the photo of above on her thread, saying it has bloomed all summer. My violet one has bloomed all summer, but the blue caerulea has grown well and formed buds but they get dry and drop off of the vine when they are about ready to open. Does anyone know why this happens?
Thanks,
Cathy
Dropping Buds
Have you been getting alot of rain or has it been quite hot? Or maybe not enough water and quite hot...
seems like either extreme will cause the buds to drop.
Each plant is in its own 3 gallon pot, which is what the seller said they should be in. The winters here can get too cold to be able to leave the plants in the ground all winter, so the advice was to put each in a large pot and overwinter them inside in a south window. It has been in the upper 80s and a few 90+ days but we have not had much rain. I don't drown them but I keep the soil moist and don't let it dry out. It has good drainage and the water never stands in it. They are both on the ledge on the south side of our front porch and they are climbing all over chicken wire that we put up to support them. According to the seller, both require the same care and one is thriving and blooming and the other drops buds. Weird.
When I bring them inside for the winter and cut them back do I water them regularly and will they grow and bloom inside? In the spring do I cut them back again before I bring them outside?
Thanks for any ideas you give me.
Cathy
I don't really know what to tell you about overwintering them inside. Here I leave them out, or if potted, and it looks like we'll get a freeze, I move them inside the barn overnight.
You might want to pop the one that's dropping buds out of the pot and take a look at the roots. Sometimes if plants get really root bound the water just run's right thru the pot and the roots don't get a chance to take up any water.
It is a young plant and it is by no means root bound. It is on a large pot saucer and there is only a little bit of water in it after I water. I got it last summer on e-bay from someone I looked up om Dave's watchdog. It hardly grew at all all smmer and when I brought it in over the winter it grew along the lace curtains and curtain rod but the leaves were not a lush green like they should have been. I cut it back per instructions and took it outside to the place it is now and it grew and formed buds. But every one of them has dried out and dropped before it bloomed .It has been fertilized and I can't find any larvae or insects in the soil or roots. Maybe I'll have to deal with a nursery and purchase a passiflora from them but I wanted this particular variety and couldn't find it except on ebay.
Thanks for your help.
Cathy.
Lotus,
Sometimes, plants as with people,animals, are just not as healthy. I have at least 5 potted up L. Margaret cuttings. Some are blooming better than the parent plant. Some are just sitting there. I would say, from my very humble opinion. And there are far better qualified folks out there, that you should maybe cut back a tiny bit on the water, and maybe give it a "1/2 "strength bloom buster. There really are much better qualified folks than my self but since no else is chiming in I will. Mark ???? Your someone who's judgment may be better able to help Lotus than me. or RJ ?
MJ, I'm not sure if you're talking about me, cause I'm certainly no expert. But if I had to guess I say its one of two things. Either the soil temp is getting too high during the day, stressing the plant, or the plant is phosphate deficient. The watering regimen sounds OK, and if the vine has green new growth then its not nitrogen deficient.
A couple of years ago I bought some of the cheapie thin black 3 gallon nursery pots on ebay. I put some passies in them this spring, and when a couple of them looked bad in early June, I checked the soil with my fingers--I was amazed at how hot it was. Anything black can really absorb heat and radiate it into the soil. Moist soil can actually make this worse, as the heat conducts better in moist soil than dry soil (of course dry soil can kill the plant outright). So I would certainly check that out.
Cathy, what type of fertilizer did you use? I'd check the numbers (phosphate is the middle number, and supports blooming), and the length of time that it releases nutrients. If the middle number was low, then I'd try some liquid bloom enhancer fertilizer, mixed less than full strength, and wait a week or two to see what happens. It usually takes at least a few days, even with the liquid fertilizer. If you could post a pic of the plant that would help.
Mark
Thanks Mark. I'll get someone to post a picture of the plant. It is in a clay pot and I have a bit of mulch on top of the soil keep moisture in but i is not touching the stems. They can get air and the soil drains properly. I will certainly try a bloom-booster.
Cathy