Passiflora coriacea, fresh seeds of bat-leaf-passionflower

seeds of Passiflora coriacea, known as bat-leaved passionflower

Passiflora coricacea belongs to the family of the Passifloraceae, the passion flowers. It is native to Centralamerica and Southamerica. Passiflora coricacea was named coricacea because its leaves are leathery and leathery means coricacea in latin. Because of the shape of its leaves P. coricacea has also some other nicknames. It is also known as bat- leaved passionflower or manta passionflower because the leaves look much like bat wings or a ray.
P. coricacea reaches a height of about 2 to 4 m. Some shouts can even get 5 m long. The bat- leaved passionflower grows quite fast, because of that is it a good idea to put something in the container the plant can entwine around.
The leaves are the most beautiful part of the plant. They are lobate and have white to light green springs on the upper side. The leaves alternate at the shoot. They can get up to 30 cm wide and 7 cm long. The flowers of P. coricacea are quite uninteresting compared to the batwing shaped leaves. The flowers reach 3 cm in diameter and are greenish to yellowish in color.
The fruits are first green and get later dark violet. They are often used for decoration. The seeds lay in the pulp. Sometime a rest of pulp has to be removed from the seeds before planting to avoid fungi growth.

Cultivation
The seeds of P. coricaceae should be put in warm water for 24 to 48 h before planting. After that they can be planted 0,5 cm deep into the substrate. The substrate should be kept moist at a temperature of about 25°C.
The adult bat- leaved passionflowers likes sunny or semi- shaded places. It is not winter hardy and should stand in the house over winter. P. coricacea does not survive temperatures under 10°C.