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Annie in Austin
Welcome! As "Annie in Austin" I blog about gardening in Austin, TX with occasional looks back at our former gardens in Illinois. My husband Philo & I also make videos - some use garden images as background for my original songs, some capture Austin events & sometimes we share videos of birds in our garden. Come talk about gardens, movies, music, genealogy and Austin at the Transplantable Rose and listen to my original songs on YouTube. For an overview read Three Gardens, Twenty Years. Unless noted, these words and photos are my copyrighted work.
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Sunday, September 23, 2007

Passion Playing

Since my passionvine does not look like the photos of Passiflora 'Incense' from other sites like Tom Spencer's, it was apparently mismarked when I bought it a few years ago. I've been scrolling through a bunch of sites and think it may be either 'Amethyst' or 'Lavender Lady'... apparently they look quite similar, but 'Amethyst' can set fruit if pollinated by another passionflower.

Did you know there's an entire Passiflora Forum at GardenWeb? That forum sent me off to other sites. The sites don't agree with one another, of course, and only some of the photos look like each other. Before I started forum-hopping I'd taken closeups to see if any readers knew the name, while playing with the camera to see how it photographed the blues and purples.


I may have gone a little overboard with this! All photos were taken in afternoon so they're a bit washed out. All were cropped and reformatted for size, but that's all - no brightening, contrast, color balance, or sharpening. I took the photo above while the flower was still attached to the vine.

Then I popped off the flower and poked the stem into the passionvine to show the bud, leaf and flower.

Hmmm, let's see how it looks over here in the shade with the Buddleja lindleyana...

To me the color of the petals looks purple, with guard filaments that look blue. Let's put it in sun next to a true blue flower - the Blue Butterfly Pea. That blue makes the passionflower tendrils look deep violet, I think.


Okay, let's go back in the shade - will it still look blue next to Salvia guaranitica?

Now for dark purple contrast - the 'Black Prince' buddleya davidia. Oh, dear, the flower has been handled and dropped so many times by now!

A final portrait in the shade with light blue Plumbago auriculata. I love the way these flowers look together... maybe some plumbago needs to grow near the passionvine.

Total immersion in purple passion works for me! I hope you enjoyed it too. Maybe I should just call this one 'Probably Lavender Lady'. Pam from Digging commented that she just bought an 'Incense' - I'll bet hers will match the label.

24 comments:

  1. I don't like it when my plants are mis-marked from the nursery either. I like to know the real names of what I have. And sometimes the differences from one variety to the next are so subtle or "results may vary depending on climatic conditions" that it is almost impossible for a gardener to figure out a plant's true variety on their own.

    How about calling this one 'Annie's Passion Which May Be Lavendar Lady'?

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  2. I agree with the gentle-woman from Indiana and hereby second the motion on the floor: Annie's Passion. (Except that in THIS case, I believe "passion" to mean "intense or overpowering emotion" and NOT "suffering".

    LOVE the moveable feast. Only YOU would do this. Fantastic idea.

    By the way, thinking of you I went out this morning and began the process of air-layering my Passiflora caerulea 'Constance Elliott'. I'll send it along to you next spring (or what you Austonian's might call summer). (Pam/Digging left a comment on an earlier post where is JUST planted something - and I'm covering for intermittant frosts. I miss Texas. I live vicariously through you ladies.)

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  3. Hi Annie,

    It looks like 'Lavender Lady' to me. I just went in and put the laptop with several of your pictures, beside my 'Lavender Lady' which is in bloom. They look identical. Of course, mine could have been mis-marked, though the plant place where I got mine was awash in different Passionvines (a passion of the owners)... so I'm thinking they are probably right.

    Ah, the Blue Butterfly pea vine ... usually, I go for the purple, but when I saw the blue butterfly bloom beside the passion flower, I chose the Butterfly! Thanks for posting a picture of it on your other blog!

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  4. Oooh - I loved the color contrast tour! And all your flowers and photos are beautiful. I especially liked the last one against the Plumbago. I had a pssionflower vine at the last house and it OVERWHELMED everything in it's path, climbing trees and trying to strangle anything within reach! Do you spend a lot of time pruning it?

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  5. I love all those colors together. Your right I think that the passion vine should grow near the plumbago or vise versa.
    I wonder what kind of passionvine I have?
    I'll have to go to that passiflora forum.

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  6. I'm sure you've got your pflower identified by now, but I wanted to mention that some are actually distinguished from each other by the leaf as much as the flower. I was thumbing through a book of pflower I.D. at the botanical garden last year, and it came down to foliage in cases when the flowers were very close. The degree of dissection and margin character can vary considerably. Just a little FYI for your Sunday afternoon.

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  7. Looks like my 'Lavender Lady' but can't say for sure. It is a very popular cultivar around here.

    :lol: on your poor passion flower looking a little beat up from posing for pictures all day.

    I find my camera does blues and purples fairly true, it is the red flowers that often come out looking strange.

    BTW, I think the Passion and Plumbago look lovely together too.

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  8. Annie, I cracked up over your traveling passionflower! Like the garden gnome in that ad. :-)

    But what a great way to "style" the garden and decide what you want to plant next to the passionflower. I agree---the plumbago looks fantastic next to it.

    And even though you didn't end up with 'Incense,' it's still a beautiful passionflower. I hope mine blooms soon.

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  9. It really is amazing how colors affect each other. What you see as blue in one looks absolutely purple next to true blue! Great idea and especially with blue/purple! Whatever the true name it is now and forever 'Annie's Passion'. In my mind anyway! Thanks for this colorful post!

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  10. Your pictures of the passion flower placed next to different flowers reminds me of the peripatetic garden gnome someone took and photographed in locations around the world. Very interesting juxapositions next to the other blue and purple colored flowers.

    My interest piqued, I looked for a passion flower that resembled yours and was floored that there were so many different kinds! Can it be Passiflora 'Bright Eyes' or Passiflora 'Betty Myles Young'?

    Here's a website I stumbled upon that has photos of many different kinds.

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  11. Ooooh, Annie, now look what you've done--gone and incited passionflower lust in me (who can't grow these lovely plants except maybe indoors. A wonderfully fun post and isn't it fascinating to see what colours do when played off one against another.

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  12. I don't know what it is, but I sure wish I had one. It's very pretty!

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  13. Elegantly creepy in an elegant sort of way...stop on over for the birthday fun

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  14. that last shot looks like a little jellyfish swimming away in the water (I just finished reading a sea creature book to my son for bedtime so maybe that's just top of mind!)

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  15. I've heard of Passion Play before but never like this. :-)

    I like to cut a flower off a newly bought plant to see where it might fit in my garden, colourwise. I don't agree with the notion that colours don't clash. You'd be amazed to hear what some flowers were saying to each other when I held them together. Definitely not something one dares mention in polite society. ;-)

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  16. Plant identification sure is a tedious job and I myself spent the entire last week in searching the correct names of my succulents, but the end result is very satisfying.

    Loved the concept of mixing and matching purple and blue.I too would say the passion flower complements Plumbago the best.

    Happy Gardening!

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  17. Of course... considering the RADICALLY DIFFERENT habits of Plumbago and Passiflora, it might be interesting to actually get the two blooms together.

    Two Words: Garden Obelisk.

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  18. I absolutely LOVE this intricate and gloriously colored flower, whatever its proper name is!

    I think I need to have a passionflower vine in my garden, and now I wonder if there are any hardy in this zone. Must do research now

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  19. This post made me laugh! I needed to laugh - boy, that Salvia guaranitica always makes things around it look - not quite what you think it looks like.

    Pretty soon this flower is gonna pop up in front of the Pyramids of Egypt or on the edge of the Grand Canyon...

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  20. Carol, it's happened pretty frequently over the years so I should be used to it, but I'd still kind of like an answer!

    Clerk Hank, you're making me blush- and the idea of a passalong Passiflora is awfully tempting. I'll try to keep the Texas-type photos coming, and will hope that IL holds off on frost for awhile.

    Kate, Lavender Lady sounds likely. The plant came from a local nursery, not a chain, but mistakes can be made anywhere.

    If this butterfly pea makes seeds, some of them need to go to Saskatchewan ;-]

    Hi Diana, all the blues and purple get me, too. I've never pruned it - this is the first year it's grown and bloomed at all. It might turn out to be a beautiful bully.

    Me, too ,Chigiy, and I'm going to figure out a way to get the plumbago & passionvine together!

    Thank you for the info Chuck, I'm pretty sure this one has 3 lobes but will look more carefully tomorrow.

    Hello DFP - maybe I should have used a spring clothes pin or something!

    It probably looked pretty funny in person, Pam/Digging - just another reason I'm glad to have a privacy fence.

    Hi Layanee - it started because I wanted to see the flower in open light, rather than through tree canopy, and just went on!

    Ki, thanks for the website - I need to check the leaves, too. One website says the only way you can tell a couple of cultivars apart is by cutting and comparing the fruit!

    Jodi, it might be time to build that conservatory!

    Zoey - I grew one as a container annual in IL - bet you could do it in Michigan.

    Happy Birthday CityFarmer - you sure do not look your age. The resemblance between you and your daughter in your young mom photos is wonderful.

    Bonnie- it was so bedraggled by then that it could be either a jellyfish or a really, colorful badminton birdie!

    Yolanda Elizabet - the well-known gardener and author Trudi Temple did this, too - she never let a daylily into the borders until it had bloomed in the holding bed and been carried around for a formal introduction.

    Green Thumb - I need to recheck your post if you've added ID's - many were mysteries to me, too!

    Hello again Clerk Hank - I like that idea! The tall metal obelisk officially belongs to the Moon vine and Blue Butterfly Pea, but perhaps I can work on Philo over the winter and see if he can come up with a wooden version for next spring.

    Hello Healingmagichands - I'm pretty sure there are a couple of natives that would like to live in your garden!

    Good thing I refreshed before I posted...hello Pam. I'm glad to give you a smile, even from something goofy like this.

    Passionflower on the Pyramids? Good title for a romance novel!

    Thank you all,

    Annie

    Thank you all

    Annie

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  21. Annie,

    New flowers to me, but they are lovely. I like the last photo with the baby blues! You have an artistic eye, for sure!

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  22. This was a fun game Annie. Total immersion works for me too :)
    Is this the same vine that passionfruits grow on? And do you have passionfruits down there??
    It's a beautiful plant and flower, and I especially love the Plumbago combo. There's another plant that I'm highly attracted to. The list just keeps growing!!!
    Lavender Lady is a pretty name and it suits this lovely blossom :)

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  23. Annie, your traveling passionvine was one of the most fun posts I've read today! I'm with you on the plumbago combo--it makes the filaments (oops, I think you called them tendrils?) of the passionflower glow blue. Lovely.

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  24. LOVE that vine! I definately have a case of zone envy!

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