Hardy Kiwi Harvest 2018

[BobVance]

@scottfsmith

You need to leave the top of the scion open as it may bleed out the end as well. On some fruits the bleeding is a major cause of graft failure but not on kiwis from my experience.

That’s good info. I’ve had horrible success with grapes and I think a big part of that is the bleeding. If you hadn’t said that, I was going to be pretty gun-shy on the kiwi.

@JesseS

The under stock likely starved out the scion you grafted, I had to rub out growth under my grafts well into the summer as they kept pushing new growth below the grafted portion.

Yup, it pushed out a ton of growth. I was trying to leave some nurse branches, so I didn’t have a zero-tollerance policy for rootstock growth. But I probably should have.

I mean to include the following in my original post…

Total kiwi harvest (planting year in parenthesis):
Issai (2011) - 12.5 qt
Jumbo (2013)- 6.5 qt
Rossana (2013)- 5.5 qt
Fortyniner (2011)- 1.5 qt
Cordofolia (2012)- 1.5 qt
Chico (2013)- 1 qt
Geneva (2011)- 4 kiwi
Ken’s Red (2011)- 0 kiwi
Total: 28.5 qt

It’s also worth noting for anyone who hasn’t grown hardy kiwi- if they are hard or even firm when you pick them, they taste pretty horrid. As Jesse noted above, after sitting on the counter for a few days, they start to ripen and build up their sugars. Once they get a bit wrinkly is when they taste good.

[BobVance]

@BobVance

I’m planning on putting a screw through this, to hold it in place…

Broken_Kiwi_Trellis_10-07-2018.JPG3264x2448 2.08 MB

I finally got around to this on Sunday. It was a pain in the rear end. There were 2 spots the trellis had come apart like that. The first one probably took me an hour, though part of it was because I had to find the right sized drill bits, wrenches, etc.

I drilled straight through, while holding the bar in place. The outside cup is easy, while the galvanized steel rail is pretty tough to drill through. Maybe I needed a different drill bit.

For the second corner, I drilled all the way through (2 holes) the outside cup first, then held it in place and marked the spots to drill on the rail. After drilling the rail, I tried to put it together and found that being off by just a bit makes a big (bad) difference. I eventually got it together, but only after moving the post around enough that 2 other bars fell out to the ground (and a 3rd that the vines caught just before it would have hit me…).

If I have to do more of them, I’m tempted to just use a small screw and only drill it into one side, rather than all the way through. Since it is pulling apart, that would keep tension on the screw and prevent slippage. Or I could just use a bigger bit to ensure that I have enough margin for error.

[Chills]

I’ve had bleeding push off attempted grafts. I find that just rooting dormant wood works fine . Hardened green wood also roots well.

My biggest problem is I suck at pruning these. This fall mine are getting cut back hard and I’m hoping to establish a better system of main stems. I’m planning on cutting them back at the tops of my 6 foot tall arbor.

With six 10 year old vines I got perhaps 2 quarts of fruit (6 females 3 males)

Actinidia polygama also roots easily.

Scott

[Barkslip]

Get a cobalt bit with a pilot point Bob and stick with bolts and nuts.

Dax

[BobVance]

@Barkslip

Get a cobalt bit with a pilot point Bob and stick with bolts and nuts.

After I finished(of course), I found the better bit set. I think they are titanium, rather than cobalt though. Still probably better than the old black bits that went through the aluminum caps without much trouble, but really bogged down on the galvanized steel. I’ll probably add another bolt just to see how different they are.

@Chills

With six 10 year old vines I got perhaps 2 quarts of fruit (6 females 3 males)

I got about 14 times as much from my top 6 vines. But both of us got next to nothing compared to the 200 pounds I’ve heard that hardy kiwi can make. If I ever get those yields I’ll need to go commercial.

[scottfsmith]

I was pleasantly surprised to get a dessert at a local restaurant last night made from local hardy kiwis. Someone in my area is going commercial… They should grow the yellow fuzzy ones as well, they are hardy here and would have been better in the dessert - the hardy ones were tasty but overpowered the other flavors.

[BobVance]

@scottfsmith

the hardy ones were tasty but overpowered the other flavors.

Have you made jam out of hardy kiwi? I think that strongly flavored fruit often makes good jam (like black currants, boysenberries, and sour cherries). I’ve got so many in the fridge that I’ll make at least one try.

[northwoodswis4]

We made jam out of four varieties of kolomikta kiwis. The recipe called for lemon juice in it to set the pectin. The lemon overpowered the jam. Nor was it as sweet as I expected after all the sugar it used. We eat it on yogurt. Next time we will try mixing it with other fruit.

[KBee]

I am starting out with hardy kiwis for the first time this year. Starting with Ananasnaya and Ken’s Red along with a male plant from Burnt Ridge Nursery. The bare root plants arrived a bit earlier than my planting site was ready, so I have them in gallon pots at the moment.

The male and Ananasnaya look healthy and vigorous, but the growth on the Ken’s is starting to look pretty chlorotic. Trying to use some blood meal in small doses to help provide some more readily available iron. Hope to have my trellis ready and get them in the ground soon.

[Chills]

Ken’s red was one of the kiwis I’ve lost over the years. I’ve never had any problem with green fruited kiwis, but the non-green have always seemed less vigorous for me.

Scott

[39thparallel]

I had not thought of grafting kiwi. I had several that died to the ground after a bad winter. I might be better than starting from scratch. And what varieties are actually hardy way up there?

[JesseS]

All arguta and kolomikta have been hardy to -25F here

[BobVance]

2019 Harvest has been a bit less than 2018, but I think a big part of that is loss to SWD and me letting some get overripe. I lost a majority of Jumbo/Chico that way.

Issai is still massively productive. It’s the only vine that I am still harvesting from, as every time I go out to pick I run out of time or containers. While most of the vines fruit poorly in the middle (I’ve now been trying to prune them to avoid that), Issai looks like this:

The best flavored are still Rossana and Cordifolia.

A Cordifolia that I picked today had 30 brix. That’s higher than Euro plums and into jujube territory!

So while I could go from 28 quarts to 20, that is still likely more than I need. So, after thinking about it a bit, I decided to take out a few of my less productive vines. It won’t reduce my yield much, but there is no sense in wasting space on them in hopes of extra production which I don’t need.

The mislabeled male (which was really a non-productive female) was the first to go. Today, I cut down the Geneva vine as well. It was more productive than last year’s 4 fruits (it’s not hard to beat that), with about a pint. But the vine was taking a ton of space. I should be able to put a couple jujubes in it’s place and start using the garden bed next to it again, as well as stop having it try to climb onto the neighboring peaches (probably contributing to brown rot…).

Geneva before:

Geneva gone:

I’m also hopeful that the tall rock wall will help the jujubes be fruitful (reflected light and heat). I’m also a bit tired of trying to climb the wall in a losing battle to keep the kiwi pruned and off the neighbor’s fence.

The next decision will be about Ken’s Red (the one next to Geneva). I think I may have gotten a single fruit from it this year (which wasn’t really red). Given Scott’s positive reviews of it, I think I’ll likely cut it back hard, but keep it around for a bit.

The same goes for Fortyniner. It had some good fruit this year, but it was only on a small part of the vine.

@BobVance

Fortyniner was a strong second tier. Interestingly, only one small part of the vine fruited. I have two explanations…

Looking above at the first post, I mentioned the same thing last year. And it was the same part of the vine that fruited again. I still don’t know which of the 2 hypothesis (if either) is correct.

[kiwinut]

@BobVance

The next decision will be about Ken’s Red (the one next to Geneva). I think I may have gotten a single fruit from it this year (which wasn’t really red).

I think the development of red pigments is very dependent on temperature. In middle Tennessee, Kens Red typically ripens in August during high temps, and does not turn red at all if vine ripened. If I pick them a bit early and ripen indoors under cool conditions, they will turn red.

[BobVance]

@kiwinut

Kens Red typically ripens in August during high temps, and does not turn red at all if vine ripened.

Maybe that is why the Rossana didn’t get as red this year. The month of September was pretty warm and sunny.

[BobVance]

@BobVance

After I finished(of course), I found the better bit set. I think they are titanium, rather than cobalt though.

The titanium bits definitely worked better than the plain black ones. But, they haven’t lasted very well. I’ve dulled one and broken another. The broken one got stuck in the hole, so hopefully it will serve the same purpose as a bolt

With the recent wind and rain, a few supports came loose. A few others were being held up by the vines. I’ve gotten it back together and added bolts to keep it that way.

I’ve been thinking about it and will likely completely graft over the larger Jumbo with Cordifolia, as I haven’t been impressed with Jumbo’s fruit quality. I’ll need to stay on top of it to keep the host vine from overgrowing the grafts…

I’m tempted to graft over the 2nd Jumbo (purchased as “Chico”, which turned out to be another name for the same thing). But I’m not sure which variety to do it with, so I’ll hold off another year.

[jxz7245]

Are you sure they are the same, from experience? I have seen one nursery say they are the same, but on some sites I see Jumbo as being from Italy, and Michigan State from Michigan. I am placing my kiwi order soon and don’t want duplicates.

[jxz7245]

I’ve read that Chico is the same cultivar as Fortyniner, do you find them to be different? Or is Chico a unique variety for you? Where is yours purchased from? Thanks

[JesseS]

There is quite a bit of confusion of varieties in the nursery trade- there are two Michigan state versions out there, and some synonyms as well. Iago Hale and his team at UNH did genetic testing of the 100+ varieties obtained from nurseries and USDA and found only 60 distinct genetics. There is a paper which can be found online which describes the findings

[BobVance]

@jxz7245

I’ve read that Chico is the same cultivar as Fortyniner, do you find them to be different?

Chico and Fortyniner are quite different. Chico is larger and Fortyniner has much better flavor. My Fortyniner hasn’t been that productive (other than one section of the vine hanging down from a neighboring tree), but I blame that more on location and pruning, than on the variety.

The Chico fruit is identical to the fruit from Jumbo. My Chico vine hasn’t grown as large, or produced as much fruit as the Jumbo, but I suspect that it is just natural variation.

@jxz7245

Where is yours purchased from?

Chico, Jumbo, and Fortyniner all came from Rolling River (Fortyniner in 2011 and the other two in 2013).