The key word is "Possible".

Here's the story:

I bought a P. edulis 'Frederick' rooted cutting (P. edulis f. edulis x P. edulis flavicarpa--a P. Worley hybrid I bought from Grassy Knoll). It had a bud and soon bloomed. P. edulis 'Frederick' is "semi self-fertile", yet I really wanted fruit. So I applied some P. vitifolia pollen. However...I did not cut off the male flower parts from the 'Frederick', nor did I do anything to stop the insects from visiting (we have tons of carpenter bees and a honey bee nest about 70 feet away).

So as I say, it's possible but far from certain that the pollen came from vitifolia. A fruit quickly formed, however it stopped growing after it reached the size of a walnut. The small size can be a sign of a hybrid--pollination is often not as efficient. On the other hand, maybe the fruit is small because the vine is small (However I have seen fairly small plants with several large fruits). Any guesses as to which it could be? The fruit was filled with seeds (no air)--about 40 seeds total. So I think all I can say is that maybe I have hybrid seeds, maybe not.

So let's see if I can remember most of the questions I had...If anyone can answer even one or two that would be great.

Can I expect the seeds to germinate like P. edulis? Could viability be a problem? I seem to remember that the contribution of the pollen parent to the fruit is minor or nonexistent. But once the embryo starts growing it should have contributions from both parents. The leaves of vitifolia are pretty different than that of edulis--any guesses as to at what stage I could tell an edulis seedling from an edulis x vitifolia one? Do both parents contribute equally to the leaves in Passiflora, or is does one or the other contribute more? (To those who say they obviously contribute the same, remember, as one example, that all mitochondrial genes come from the mother. There are other factors that can contribute)

Germinating the seeds: My major concern here is about possible growth inhibitors. I've tried twice to grow grocery store fruit (edulis f. edulis.) I planted all of these pretty densely (say 20 in a 12 oz. cup. The first seeds didn't germinate at all. The second set wasn't germinating,so I flushed the cups through until I thought it was likly that any inhibitors should be removed--as judged by when the peat tannins were removed). The seeds then grew and I got esentially 100% germination--but I don't really know if this was actually caused by the flushing. So...after all of that explanation--my question is should the seeds be planted sparsely to get good germination? How long does P. vitifolia take to germinate? Any guesses as to how long a hybrid would take? Temperature: can I assume there's no reason to try a few outside right now? (highs 70s, lows 50s).

I know I have a lot more quesstions, but I'm getting tired. To summarize so far: Any tricks for germination?--I have very mixed success with P. edulis (and I really don't want to screw this up). And: how and when can I tell whether it has contributions from both P. vitifolia and P. edulis? No doubt I will think of a few more questions right after I post this.

So thanks in advance it anyone has any ideas/experiences. And thanks for reading such a long post!

Oh, I thought of one more question. Is there any possibility the seeds could be a mix of P.edulis and P. edulis x P. vitifolia?