In this article, we give you Top Tips For Growing Passion Fruits. Passion fruits are easy growing plants that can include every home garden. Besides, it is rich in lots of vitamins and minerals. But many gardeners face some common problems when it comes to growing passion fruits. So here are the Top Tips For Growing Passion Fruit and it will help you to grow healthy plants.
Identify The Major Diseases of Passion Fruits
It is important to identify diseases that greatly affect Passion Fruits.
There are three major disease that effects on passion fruits. They are
- Passion fruit viral disease
- Root rot disease
- Leaf spot disease
Let’s get to know about these diseases as top tips for growing passion fruits.
1. Passion Fruit Viral Disease
Because of this disease, the harvest will be reduced. And also the fruits become poor quality. It has now been discovered that the disease is caused by the virus belonging to the cucumber mosaic and the “Y” group of potatoes.
Symptoms of Passion Fruits Viral Disease
- The main symptom is the leaves of the passion fruits are unnatural deformation.
- In addition, the leaves are shriveled and yellowing.
- Sometimes can see the yellow ring-like spots.
- The growth of the vines is poor.
- The Fruits are small and twisted.
- The fruits in the infected plants are hard and unnatural.
At once we can see one or more symptoms.
How The Disease Spread?
- The most common way of spreading disease do by aphids.
- Also, pruning equipment can spread the disease.
- Aphids do not accumulate on passion fruits, but they can be found in large numbers on chilies, Eggplants / Brinjal, Okra, legumes, and cucumber.
How To Control The Disease?
- Destroy weeds that serve as hosts for aphids around the plantation.
- Prevent aphidicidins from other crops grown near the plantation.
- Before planting a new crop, destroy the diseased vines of the old plants, and protect new plants from aphids and viruses.
Once disease infected to the passion fruits plants cannot cure. But we can reduce the spread of the disease. Apply fertilizer gradually to make strong plants. In the first, six months check the plants at least once a week. If you found Virus-infected plants remove them from the garden and burn them.
2. Root Rot Disease
When a root rot disease infected, the vines become wither.
How The Disease Spread?
This is happened because of Pythium, Phytophthora, a fungus that lives in the soil and excessive water amount in the soil.
Symptoms of Passion Fruits Root Rot Disease
- Plants in the nursery die at the soil level and the roots become rotten.
How To Control The Disease?
- Sterilize the soil of the nursery to protect the nursery plants from infection.
- Improve drainage on farmland.
- In addition, the following fungicides can be used for the prevention and control of the disease.
- Mix 80% captan fungicide 4g or 50% of captan 6g with water as instructed in the bottle and apply it to a square meter area around the vine.
3. Leaf Spot Disease
When this disease happened you can see the dry brown spots in the passion fruits leaves.
How The Disease Spread?
- Several types of fungi affect the disease.
- Although the disease is more frequent during the rainy season, under the dry weather, the disease gradually decreases.
How To Control The Disease?
Removal of excessive spotted leaves can help control the spread of the disease. “No need to use fungicides”.
Do Artificial Pollination
Artificial pollination is another top tip of growing passion fruit. If the plants are planted in a timely manner and the crops are well maintained and will flower in 4-6 months. So artificial pollination of these flowers is very important in increasing the number of fruits.
The best time of the day for artificial pollination is between 1 and 6 pm.
Using soft brush or thumb and index finger take the pollen in anthers. Then put it into the stigma carefully. This is how to do artificial pollination to help with more fruits in the garden.
An experienced person can pollinate as many as 2000-3000 flowers a day.
And also dry weather must-have of least 2 hours after pollination.
When the rain happened in the evening it’s better to start pollination at 10 a.m. These days you can open the flowers and pollinate. Besides artificial pollination does not spread viral diseases.
In the passion fruits, most flowers are pollinated without artificial pollination because of the carpenter bee and honey bee. But if your garden area has more prevalent bees may weaken flower pollination. Because they collect the pollen in flowers.
Passion Fruit Pruning
In the passion, fruit blossom happened in the new shoots. Therefore, regular pruning can stimulate the growth of manual shoots and increase yields. Remember pruning should be done after harvesting.
Pruning is not advisable during rainy weather.
Weak sections of branches and branches that touch the ground should be Pruning. Apply the fertilizer immediately after pruning. Also, Remove branches that grow close to each other. Do not allow the growing branches to overlap.
Pruning knives can be a reason to infect viral diseases. So vines infected with the virus should be done carefully. Also in such cases, healthy vines should be pruning first. Infected plants should be done last.
However, as mentioned earlier it is better to remove the infected plants from the garden.
Harvesting Techniques
The main harvest season is from March to August.
Well-ripened fruit falls to the ground. Commercial crop harvesting should complete at once.
The rest of the time harvest will depend on the color of the fruit. As a home gardener, you can do it easily.
In addition, Experienced growers can easily find the harvest time of fruits. They gently tap to the fruits and recognize the best fruits by sound. For this color changed in fruits not considered.
Harvest the purple-colored fruits when they become purple. The juice amount in young fruits is very low. Harvest only when there is dry weather.
The economic life span of passion fruit is about five years. The maximum yield of a crop is about three years.
Use these top tips for growing passion fruits and have a successful harvest.