Thanks!
Thanks! Yes I saw that. Is there any way to tell from the leaves or something? Otherwise I guess I need to try to get a few from different places and see what they produce. Or try to call the nursery but I suspect I’ll have low results from that. I suspect they will be like “Yes this is Issai” 
… but you never know.
@kiwinut and @Chills - so would you basically recommend any arctic kiwi then for a low chill low space environment?
Edit: I was also thinking of getting a couple of the Arctic Kiwi varieties (maybe 3-4) and having them all in a single 20gal pot along with a single male in the same pot. Do you think that’s a bad idea? I was thinking of a single pot to make watering simpler and also have better water retention given the extra potting mix in there.
OGW seems to have a large selection. Any suggestions on specific varieties or do you think any are good to try?
The variety that did best for me several years ago was Krupnopladnaya, followed by September Sun. I currently have a small Viktor, which has not done much, but that may be due to neglect. It had a couple of berries last year, but chipmunks got them long before they were ripe. It has just two flower buds on it right now. I never had a male, so I was hand pollinating them with pollen from yellow kiwis or fuzzy kiwi. The fuzzy kiwi pollen set nice fruit, but never produced any viable seeds. Diploid yellow kiwi pollen did produce viable seeds.
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Thanks! Super helpful!
I only have the one small Actinidia kolomitka I refereced in the previous post. My others are all A Agunta and A polygama. I would think that plating multiples varieties in a single pot, even 20 gal, would make maintence, like pruning, extremely difficult. I also don’t know about growing A kolomitka in a zone 10 garden…
Perhaps someone with more experience with the Arctic kiwis will chime in.
Personally I’d love to find a Dr Szymanowski as it is supposed to be a self-fruitful and variegated Arctic Kiwi.
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I’m growing a ‘Dr. Szymanowski’ to determine how self fertile it is. I decided not to plant any other Arctic kiwi cultivars so that I won’t have any accidental cross-pollination. If it ends up setting fruit then I’ll be confident as to whether it is self-fertile. So far I can vouch for it being attractively variegated like the typical male selections.
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Ill second ‘Krup’ ie ‘Kruplodonaya’ as a good kolomikta. I have it and ‘Sept Sun’ ie ‘Sentyabraskya’ and the latter makes smallish fruit of less than stellar quality. To me they taste sort of acrid and soap like, and I generally have a pretty high tolerance for unusual flavors. I barely ever pick them. Krup fruit is bigger and much more arguta like in flavor. I saw it a mature Krup vine at Brooklyn Botanical Garden and they it was enormous, holding its own with the mature argutas. That makes me suspect it is more vigorous that other kolomiktas, which are generally much more precocious and far less vigorous.
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How old is your vine? I’ve observed that A. kolomikta begin fruiting much earlier than A. arguta.
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Do you have a male or is it truly hermaphroditic?
My ‘Dr. Szymanowski’ vine is two years old (from cutting). I put it in ground last year and am hoping it is ready to put on a decent amount of growth this year. It has nice fat buds now and looks happy so fingers crossed.
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Thank you @kiwinut, @Chills, @JohannsGarden for all the feedback and advice above. I finally ordered the following, will keep this thread posted on progress over time:
Issai Hardy Kiwi
Flowercloud Male Hardy Kiwi
and then
Krupnopladnaya Arctic Beauty Kiwi
September Sun Arctic Beauty Kiwi
Red Beauty Arctic Beauty Kiwi
and
Pasha Male Arctic Beauty Kiwi
Excited to see how all of this does in my yard in pots.
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It will be interesting to see the progress of your kiwi growing in SoCal. What size containers are you using? I’m also in the SoCal region with very low chill and recently got Jenny fuzzy kiwi (self fertile and 100 chill hours), a male fuzzy kiwi (should increase the fruit on Jenny), and Krupnoplodnaya Arctic Beauty kiwi.
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Thanks!
I haven’t received the plants yet. They will ship the end of April it seems.
They are all 1gal pots coming in, so I was thinking of putting them in 10gal root pouches? I have some narrower tomato cages that I think might be ideal but I was planning on testing that this weekend as I prepare the root pouches to see if 10gal is good or if I need to go bigger even to start.
Also considering 15gal black plastic containers.
I’m thinking that 20gal containers might be too big to put these in day 1.
Do you have yours in the ground?
Also - do you have a pollinator for the Krup?
I’ve started mine in 10 gallon fabric containers. I am using the same type of galvanized steel wire fence that I use for my passionfruit vines, also in containers, which are doing very well. I don’t currently have a pollinator for the Krup, but I plan on grafting that one with an arctic male.
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Interesting that you are doing passion fruit in those too. Do you have the passion fruit in 10gal pots too? Would love to see pictures if you get a chance so I can see your successful setup.
What did you use for your pots as the potting medium? I’m planning on using Gary’s Top Pot amended with some compost and organic fertilizer (probably Tree Tone).
My trellis is ready. I just ordered Hardy Red kiwi from One green world. Hopefully hardy red is not the same Ken’ red. Even said it very popular in taste tests. However it’s not much information about it.
Any reports about hardy red very appreciated.
Best Hardy kiwis I’ve tasted are Cordifolia and LiLi. Lili is Kiwibobs vine — seed originally came from China. It’s not possible to find it in the nursery trade.
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Are there any varieties that do better in poorly drained soils? My female genevas died this spring, probably due to root rot. I have plans to try again and plant in a larger mount of dirt, but if there are more rot resistant varieties I would like to try them.
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Just an idea: I have planted my hardy kiwis in a part of the garden that would get surface flooded once or twice every other year and I stopped growing veg there for that reason. Some of them died over winter/ early springs. Those that survived, prosper and fruit were all planted next to trees or in competition with other vines. And the trees also provide trellising because I let the kiwis climb up into their canopy.
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