Can’t display date in wp_query

I used <?php echo get_the_date( 'd.m.Y' ); ?> to display the date on my other pages, but I have dried the_time()l, the_date() etc. and none of these seem to work to display the date in my post.

I used wp_query to display the posts, but I can’t get the date to show. Does anyone have a solution?

<?php                                                     
                    $args = array(
                                    'posts_per_page' => '-1',
                                    'post_type' => 'post',
                                    'post_status' => 'publish',
                                    'category__in' => $quicksand_categories 
                                    );                     
                    $query = new WP_Query( $args );                                             
                    foreach ($query->posts as $item) {                      
                        $categories = wp_get_post_categories($item->ID);
                        ?>
                        <li id="item" class="item" data-id="id-<?php echo $item->ID ?>" data-type="<?php foreach ($categories as $c) { echo $c . ' ';}?>" >

                        <div class="article_info">
                            <h3>
                                <?php if(get_option('titles') == 'yes') { ?>
                                    <a href="<?php echo get_permalink($item->ID); ?>">
                                        <?php echo get_the_title($item->ID); ?>
                                    </a>
                                <?php } ?>
                                / <?php $cat_id = $c; $cat_name = get_cat_name( $cat_id ); echo $cat_name;?>

                            </h3>
                            <span class="post_date"><?php echo get_the_date( 'd.m.Y' ); ?></span>
                        </div>

                        <?php  if (get_option('featured') == 'yes') { ?>
                           <a href="<?php echo get_permalink($item->ID); ?>">                   
                        <?php  echo get_the_post_thumbnail($item->ID,'full');  ?></a>
                        <?php } ?>
                           <br />
                         <p><?php $post = get_post($item->ID); echo $post->post_excerpt; ?></p>

                        <a href="<?php echo get_permalink($item->ID); ?>">
                         <img src="<?php bloginfo('template_url');?>/images/viemore_photos.png" alt="View More photos"/> 
                        </a>
                       </li>                                        
                    <?php  }  ?>