Passionfruit flowering but not fruiting

[Meloncat]

My passionfruit that I purchased from Bunnings has grown like mad and flowers profusely,  however the flowers just fall to the ground and it doesn't produce any fruit, does anyone know why this would occur?

 

 

[MitchellMc]

Welcome to the Bunnings Workshop community @Meloncat. It's wonderful to have you join us, and many thanks for your question about passion fruit vines.

How much fertiliser have you been giving it? Too much can cause the flowers to drop. You'll just need to fertilise early spring with Yates 1.5kg Thrive Natural Citrus And Fruit Organic Based Pelletised Plant Food and then hold off until late summer/autumn. The abundance of lush green growth tells me that most of the plant's energy is likely going into the growth of green material and not into fruit production.

How often do you water, and have you applied a mulch around the plant's base? Passion fruit vines don't like their soil to dry out completely, and mulch will assist with this. They also don't like wet feet, so don't over-water.

Do you happen to know the variety and if it is self-fertile? Some varieties require a second plant to cross-pollinate with.

See many ants on the vine? Ants can cause flowers not to set and, unfortunately, like to make passion fruit vines their home.

Many bees in your backyard? If you lack native pollinators, you can try doing so by hand with a paintbrush. Simply go around to all the flowers and twist the paintbrush in their centre. This collects pollen from the stamens and distributes it to the pistils of other flowers. A little potash can sometimes help fruit set as well.

Can I get you to check that this abundance of growth is not coming from under the graft line at the vine's base? If you're struggling to find it, please take another photo encompassing the soil to around 20cm up the vine. 

You should find this guide useful: How to grow and care for passion fruit.

I'm looking forward to hearing more about your plant. Please let me know if you have any questions.

Mitchell

[Meloncat]

Hi Mitchell 

Thanks  for your reply.

As far as fertilizer goes I use an all purpose citrus and fruit one, I haven't fertilized this growing season yet as I thought that may have been the problem last year but it is doing the same thing this season anyway. 

Watering wise it is on a drip system and gets watered around 3 times a week depending on the season. It is mulched so the roots wouldn't dry out.

See the pics below for the variety,  not sure if it's self pollinating or not?

No ant issues on the vine itself other than the usual black ants on the ground.

The foliage is growing above the graft, see photo.

And although there are not a huge amount of bees around there are some and they did a good job on my fruit trees and love my Basil for some reason.

Hoping you could shed some more light on my issue now.

Thanks. 

 

 

 

 

[EricL]

Hello @Meloncat

It's great that you've received excellent advice from @MitchellMc. Would it be possible for you to post a photo of the fertilizer you're using? If it has a heavy nitrogen content, this will often cause flowers to drop off. I recommend trying Searles 250ml Liquid Potash. It's a fertiliser formulated for promoting bigger and better flowers. It improves fruit and vegetable size, quality, and quantity, as well as promoting hard plant growth and disease resistance. Please note that this is a concentrate and must be diluted before use.

If you need more advice or information, please let us know.

Eric

[MitchellMc]

@Meloncat,

The graft line and growth photo is a bit busier than what I would like to see. I'm looking for a definitive graft line and all growth being above that line with no suckers coming out from under it or at ground level. Can you show me at ground level in the one photo? We need to establish that all this green growth isn't just the rootstock.

If you haven't moved it, the tag is attached to the plant's main stem, but my concern is all that growth is from well below that line.

Mitchell

[Meloncat]

Thanks, I have applied this product. Hopefully it produces now

[MitchellMc]

Keep us updated @Meloncat. We're looking forward to hearing of a bountiful harvest.

Mitchell

[Roberte86]

I have exactly the same problem, FOR THE SECOND TIME

I bought the big spotted variety from Bunnings a few years ago and it went crazy, huge healthy vine, hundreds of flowers, but NOT ONE passionfruit for about 3 years until I cut it out. I bought the same one again and am having the exact same problem AGAIN. I have a Passiflora edulis (Black Passionfruit) within 4 metres of this vigorous plant and it is loaded with fruit, so the problem has nothing to do with soil or water. IF the case is that I need TWO plants together to get fruit the WHY didn't Bunnings staff tell me that when I bought the second one?

[mich1972]

Hi @Meloncat  Welcome to the Workshop Community 😊

Ok , this is what I’m doing with our Passionfruit vines in our garden. This is just my opinion and it works for me. 
We are in Perth. I have two Sunshine Special Passionfruits which are suited for Perth growing conditions. They are Non Grafted so no suckers popping up everywhere. They are flowering and fruiting well. 

I am NOT feeding them with any high nitrogen fertilisers, otherwise too much foliage and hardly any flowers. So I have only once at the start of Spring gave them some Richgro Rock Minerals. I love using this fertiliser. 

I do apply Richgro Sulphate of Potash regularly, as a liquid application every 4-5 weeks. Started applying it at the start of Spring. This will promote more flowers and strengthen the flowers to stop them dropping. 

I do have Perennial Basil growing right next to them to encourage and attract Pollinators to come in. I have heaps of Bees to help increase Pollination, I truly believe this is extremely important when you are growing an Edible Garden. 

Also I only water as needed as I don’t like to overwater them. Irregular watering can affect it flowering as well. 

I hope this may help you. Good luck and looking forward to seeing an update AND heaps of beautiful Passionfruit on your vines 😊🌿

[Jewelleryrescue]

Hi @Meloncat  And all

No Fruit and or friut with no pulp inside can be the lack of pollenation of  flowers

As an ex Dept of agriculture registered and course trained bee keeper one  of the ways to make money from bees was to Increase hive poputations and hire your hives out to  primary producers to pollenate crops. In  Fact Austrailian  bee keepers  send zillions of healthy bees to  USA  as their bees  have Varoa mites killing there bees  Aussies bees  then  die too .With out good pollenation the crop would only produce 10% yield  depending on the crop.  This Includes  passionfruit vines. Bees  currently in Newcsastle are under heavy quaratine as varoa mite detected in the region Nasty  business.

now Passionfruit vines have both male bits and female bit on same plant (Stamen and Pistill) so you can try the following after fertaliser is feed to them every 6-8 weeks.

Hand pollination,  to encourage fruiting process in case bees in your area out of  range which can happen in Australian cities.  Support your city beekeepers our jobs are to manage risks to public too via passive queen bee selection  (I used to mail order genetically selected passive  and pre mated queen bees via post . Queens are artificially inseminated with 100 drones  and she stores that sperm for 3 years of her life this ensures Passive bees).  If the bees have richer nectar sources closer by they wont need to  travel to your passionfruit. A bee needs to visit 12 million flowers to make 1 litre of honey. One honey bee will visit approx 3000 flowers  per day. Busy as a bee.

Hand pollination This  can be done with a  paintbrush by collection pollen from the stamen and spreading it to the pistil of another flower on the  same vine.

Try co planting lavender around your vine to attract more bees to the with more fragrent flowers they will then visit passionfriut flowers too,

Hope this  helps