Hi Kiwinut + other Kiwi enthusiasts, I read your great posts in the kiwi section of garden web and was wondering if you could answer some questions for me, keeping them as simple as possible as I'm a beginning gardener( in the past I have grown in pots: lemon trees from seed, plus some herb and ornamental plants and they have not died, but have no experience with exotics and edibles; I have recently got Pitaya/DragonFruit plants but do not know yet what my success will be with them). I have tasted the Golden Kiwi(which I believe you call the Yellow Kiwi) at Whole foods and Ralphs, and would like to grow the variety of this plant that will fruit the soonest and most abundantly: 1). Will it grow that way in my growing situation described below? 2). If so, what is the name of the variety I need? 3). Can I grow it/buy a plant now? 4). Where can I buy the most mature/largest plant now? I'm assuming that is the most successful way to grow for quickest fruit and greatest chance at survival, or is a cutting better? 5). Are there stores which sell that I can walk into, or do I need to order online? 6). About how much does it cost? 7). In my situation would you recommend getting/growing 1 plant or 2( for the fruiting and abundance help of pollination...?). 8). I can trade large Pitaya magenta or white fleshed Dragon Fruit cuttings if anyone lives in So Cal and wants to do a trade, do you know of anyone? Here is my situation: I have an east facing balcony in West Los Angeles which gets direct light from early morning til 10:45am then indirect light after that; I am less than 3 miles from the coast so have coastal moisture. I need to grow in a pot. You mentioned a Red variety... In the photo link you gave in the forum I saw a green flesh with red flesh at center, I also saw a sort of orange fleshed fruit: Are 1 of these the red flesh, or is the red flesh entirely red? How does the taste compare to the Golden/Yellow and the conventional green? If you do recommend my getting a 2nd plant would you recommend it being a red as much as a green? Thank you so much! ~Diana(310)936-3150 I will post this also in the forum to make sure it gets to you, and to help anyone from my zone who may also be curious in the answers to these questions, or have answers.

Glenn, It's my first post! I'm in USDA zone 7a in Maryland and I've been very happy with Ken's Red. It is a LOT more vigorous than Issai, so either plan on some heavy duty pruning or make sure you have the room. The fruits are larger and, in my family's opinion, they taste better. You might also want to consider Ananasnaya aka Anna (make sure it's not the Kolomikta, but the Arguta variety) which is the most popular commercial cultivar. Since you've struggled to get fruit in spite of having waited 8 years, you might also consider Geneva. It is very vigorous too, but there are dozens of flowers on my Geneva this year and it's only 2 years old! For any non-Issai variety, that's fast. By comparison, it took 3 years for my Ken's Red to produce a couple fruits. The 4th year, I got maybe 20. The 5th year (which is this year), I counted over 1400 flowers, so I'm going to get a bumper crop! My Issai went through a similar pattern, but started on year 2 - which is not unusual for that clone. Fortunately, it's cranking up the volume. Last year, which was year 4, I had a few hundred and this year there's around 2,000 flowers or so. Of course, the Issai fruits are quite a bit smaller than the Ken's Red, so I should get more lbs out of the Ken's Red this year (I'm guessing 40 lbs or so) and A LOT more next year, since it's still a young plant. All of these varieties are (or at least, were) available at EdibleLandscaping. Considering everything, I'd probably decide between those three based on when I wanted the fruits. Ananasnaya ripens later, about 3 weeks after Ken's Red. Geneva is earlier; it ripens a couple weeks before Issai. For me at least, Ken's Red and Issai ripened around the same time. Any of EdibleLandscaping's male Argutas will pollinate those. I hope that helps answer your question. Good luck! - kiwi_MD

I can't say for certain that your kiwi suffers from iron chlorosis. However, iron chlorosis does cause leaves to turn yellow, and it is often caused by soil pH that is too high, which prevents the plant from absorbing iron through the roots. If you have wild blueberries, azaleas, and rhododendrons growing wild in your area, then the native soil must be on the acid side of the pH scale. You might have hard water, you might not, tap water comes from underground acquifers, usually. I have caused blueberry shrubs to suffer from yellow leaves, by watering them with our tap water, which is supplied by the city, and has a pH of 7.6. There is a lot of limestone in Wisconsin. I realize that checking pH is not practical when only one or two plants are involved. Based on what you describe, I suspect that the soil around your kiwi is on the alkaline side of the scale, maybe pH = 7.5. If you have watered the plant with tap water, that contains dissolved limestone, then the pH will have moved up in that particular spot. To know for sure if soil pH is causing the yellow leaves, the pH would have to be checked.

I have a very similar problem. I was really good at measuring the cabinet placement and had plans that in theory were perfect. All of a sudden things didn't quite fit the way they were supposed to....part of the problem being that the Craigs List cabs that I saw out of their boxes and brown butcher paper were perfect. I assumed those cabs that were still wrapped were the same. Nope. So we had to switch a few cabinets and in doing so a couple cabinets ended up being larger than the plan. Enter: Switchplates in places that tile shouldn't go. I think by the time we came to that part, I was soooo tired of the whole thing I said "Leave it! Don't worry about it! Who's gonna notice!?!" And honestly, nobody notices until I point it out to them. But again, honestly, now that it's all put together, it does bother me.... a LOT. I haven't been any help but just wanted you to know that there are so many of us out there who have run into the same situation.