Passion fruits are mainly grown from seeds which can be bought from a farm supply shop or from a healthy passion fruit.
A fruit with a dark purple colour is a sign that it has good seeds. If you want to prepare your own seeds, follow the steps strictly.
Get the seeds and dry them. After drying the seeds, they are planted in a nursery bed with soil mixed with compost manure.
However, if you are getting them from another farm, it is important to first inspect the farm for any signs of diseases.
Diseases include damaged seeds and spotted fruits. This is because many farmers have ended up carrying seedlings with diseases to their farms.
In the first week, the seedbed should be covered with mulch to provide warmth, vital for germination but after two weeks, a shelter is made out of leaves or grass and erected over the nursery bed.
The shelter should be made in such a way that it allows free circulation of air and the bed must be watered regularly, at least twice a week — morning and evening.
The shelter reduces the impact of the sun and helps maintain moisture in the soil.
After germinating, the seedlings should be put in polythene bags, with soil to help create roots faster, but farmers should ensure that they do not overwater the seedlings as this might cause root rot.
A stem in nursery needs at least quarter a litre per day. The seedlings take two to three months to be transferred to the garden.
However, before transferring them to the garden, holes of 3x3ft should be dug a month earlier and manure put in them.
You need at least 750 seedlings for each acre. A spacing of 8x8ft should be followed while planting the passion fruits in the garden.
Farmers are advised against leaving a depression at the core root of the plant as this may result in water logging and hence root rot.
