Topic: Wilkos Kiwi

[Chrispy]

Last weekend I bought one of the Kiwi plants from Wilkos.
I gave the little twig some water and stuck it on the window sill, and is looking healthy, See Pic.
So now I am off to find a bigger pot to pot it on, so I can grow it on a bit indoors.
My eventual plans are to grow it in a pot against my south facing wall.

Anybody got any tips? I know there have been threads before about these, and a few of you tried these last year, so how have you got on?

[chriscross1966]

Which variety is it... I only know of two self-fertile ones, Jenny and Issai,  and even they prefer to have extra pollination...

chrisc

[Chrispy]

It's a Jenny, Wilkos have come to their senses and now actually put the variety name on the box.

[ACE]

Make sure you have plenty of room as they do tend to spread a long way. Being a wilkos special I expect they are very tender as they force them on, so leave it in a big pot for a couple of years, moving it in when the winter comes. Mine gives loads of fruit some years but I mainly grew it for the highly scented flowers.

[telboy]

Hi Ace,
I posted about replacing my wysteria with an edible red grape. One reply mentioned that a Kiwi could be an alternative & you had some advise. The wysteria was difficult to maintain (ladder work & my age etc.) so "is a Kiwi a viable alternative"? Love the idea of highly perfumed flowers as well as edible fruit!

[lovelylauren]

I have got a jenny kiwi in a large pot climbing pergola in centre of a south facing garden...its a poor show.......bout 1mtr of growth and a couple of leaves....no flowers two yrs on. have planted it in miracle grow and given plant food but it doesnt seem to want to thrive...not sure what im doing wrong any ideas? :-\ :-\

[saddad]

Welcome to A4A Lauren...
My two initial ideas would be not enough water... rampant leafy climbers need a lot of water to support all that expected growth. More likely though I'd check for vineweevils... they love pots on warm patios.. lookout for irregular notches on the edges of new leaves in Spring or tip out the plant and look for large white maggots with darker heads...  :-\

[ACE]

Hi Ace,
I posted about replacing my wysteria with an edible red grape. One reply mentioned that a Kiwi could be an alternative & you had some advise. The wysteria was difficult to maintain (ladder work & my age etc.) so "is a Kiwi a viable alternative"? Love the idea of highly perfumed flowers as well as edible fruit!

I would drastically prune the wisteria and layer some of the lower runners, then try a kiwi alongside, that way if the kiwi doesn't take of, as is often the case you have not lost anything, but when they do take off they are animals. So if you are having problems keeping the wisteria in place it might not be the best idea. You will have to train it well  to ease the maintenance. If you can afford to pay a nice young lady to prune it for you, then you could 'steady the ladder' and maintenance is then a chore to look forward to ;)