I think I sowed my passiflora Incarnata like in september or october. I also sowed an unamed passion flower that same day. Well I got Incarnata sprouts this past week. I also sowed some Passiflora caerulea maybe january or febuary and I haven't got sprouts yet. This is my first time sowing passionflower but I have heard they take awhile to germinate and they are hard to break that dormancy cycle. Some advise to even soak in some kind of acidic mixture prior to sowing, like even orange juice. Also they advise to remove the, oh me what is that technical name, you know that stuff around the seed. I didn't remove it on the passiflora Incarnata, but it was removed on the caerulea and the unamed before sowing.

Wow, this sounds like the problem I had two years ago (last year I didn't do a lot of gardening, you may recall). I was going totally insane (like you) and I swear, my neighbors probably wondered about me and my 'washing the flowers' all the time... ;p and wandering around talking to myself with the Amdro and Safer Ant Spray. Our yard smelled quite minty! The spiders are DEFINITELY a pain. This morning I noticed the webs have started appearing. I don't know how to get rid of the spiders either. We had the most massive spiders ever two years ago and I mean HUGE ones that would spin these webs that would criss-cross the yard. I tell you, it was like they'd spin them in an hour or something. I can't stand them but my husband would FREAK! I know that one thing that I did with the ant situation was put those dryer softener sheets around everywhere. I rubbed down pots (the outsides). It did scare me to think that whatever was IN the sheets repelled ants, though...I bought so much Amdro I think the folks at Ace Hardware thought I was a bit kinky or something. I haven't noticed nearly as many Aphids (uh oh, I am certain to have loads of 'em now!) this year but you know? We haven't had much rain this year! The overall precipitation has been really low in SoCal so this may have something to do with it...I don't rightly know. Spiders are ALWAYS a problem but those gigantic ones haven't been out and about lately. I am afraid now that I've said something, they'll be out in droves... Good luck. The only thing to try that you haven't mentioned would be those dryer sheets. I bought boxes upon boxes of them.

What varieties are they? There are very few Passifloras that would survive outdoors over winter in Oregon, except the root hardy types. Scratch the vine and see if there is any green. If not, then the vines are dead, but may come back from the roots depending on the varieties. It would still be way too early to see any new shoots from the roots.

Thanks Islandbreeze! Plumerias are one of my favorite tropicals, I definitely recommend them. And I think I am confusing the oleander in this pic with my pink one which is a Calypso. Thanks for catching that! My home depot carries crape myrtles a lot lately so you can check yours and maybe you'll get lucky. They are great trees, I'm sure the hardier varieties would do well by you in a good spot. Crapes are really commonly sold here now, they are one of the few trees that can be grown as street trees in NYC (since you need to get your street trees approved before you plant them here) which I think is pretty cool since they are so synonymous with the south. Thanks for looking! -Alex