My Passiflora "Incense"

I bought an Incense Passion Vine about a month and a half ago, it came with roughly 4 inches or so sticking out of the soil. It is now over 4 feet tall with two large, healthy looking vines. After I re-potted the plant (and even made a bamboo trellis!), it started growing smaller vines from off of the original two which I have taken to mean that it really likes the new pot, soil and fertilizer. However, I have been wondering if I would be able to see any blooms before it dies back for the winter. It won't bother me if it won't, I realize i bought a young vine during prime time (lol)...and just wanted to give it a try.

Thanks! I love this site so much....next check I'm getting a year subscription!

You may see a bloom or two this year depending on the weather. My plant is in the ground here in zone 8b/9a and has just started budding out.

A woman at the gardening shop around the corner said that she had thought she had heard that sometimes you could shock them into bloom by denying light and water, but that didn't sound like a good idea to me right then....plus i don't know how that could have ever been replicated in nature, so i felt a little uncomfortable. Is there any truth to it? I know yours is in the ground, but maybe someone else with a potted could chime in? :)

I wouldn't recommend that approach--I'd just be patient with it. It'll bloom when it's ready, and if you try to do things like that to try and force it to bloom you run the risk of damaging/killing it in the process (not to mention that it still wouldn't guarantee blooms).

I did get a few blooms on my Incense its first year, but I had planted it in the ground the previous fall so it had a lot more time to get established and get going before blooming season came around. So if you don't get any blooms I wouldn't worry, but if you do it would be a nice surprise.

Yeah...it sounded a bit questionable to me as well. I plan to leave it in the pot so that i can overwinter it inside for this year at least. I'd love to get some blooms, but like I said it wouldn't bother me too badly, there's always tearing through pictures of other people's!

I have been trying out passifloras for about 4 years now...I live in the middle of Long Island which can experience brutal winters and summers. The passiflora will bloom when it's ready. I planted a Blue Bouquet at the end of May...we have had a very very hot Summer this year. I had lots of vine - now almost 20 feet, growing over the trellis. No flowers...until about 3 weeks ago (mid August)..one day BAM tons and tons of blooms. Try to be patient - she may bloom for you yet. Overwinter her and then replant when the ground is warm next year. You are going to love it when it starts to bloom...the flowers are so unusual...I love mine. BTW - my first passiflora went into the ground about 4 years ago. My overwintering tool was to cut a piece of styrofoam and cover the roots (to prevent the freeze and thaw we have during the winter and spring. Well...that plant never came back BUT...it must have seeded itself into the pachysandra because it has come back every summer since, about 5 feet away from where I first planted her.

Yeah, I'm hoping for the best - if it'll bloom that'd be awesome. I love the blooms of passion flowers, and can't wait to see if mine turns out to be the lighter pinkish variety or if they're the deep purple/blue kind...it seems like those are the two ends of the spectrum for this cultivar. I'd like to try a few others down here too next summer, but from most of what I can find, this variety and one of its parents (Incarnata) are hardy in my zone :( Maybe there are others? I don't know all that much so it'd be neat to hear what else you've been successful with up in NY!

I should show you WHY I even started growing these! Back in June, my girlfriend and I visited Shangri'La Botanical Gardens in Orange, TX and I happened to walk by a Passiflora Caerulea on our way out. I hadn't ever seen one of these flowers before, so I had to take a picture. It was mezmerizing! :)

Here's my shot of a Caerulea - but this is NOT mine lol. i wish!