"newsb" wrote in message
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In article , Spider
writes
Despite the rain, I went out to do a little job in the garden. Instead of
doing that job, I saw a very sad plant which needed some attention. The
plant was a once *beautiful* yellow Primula bulleyana which I'd bought on
holiday. It was magnificent! That same plant appeared collapsed and,
when
I investigated, there were about 50 vine weevil larvae in the crown and
rootball of the plant. There is almost nothing left, and I doubt that
that
'almost nothing' will survive. I will see what can be done, but it's not
hopeful. Boo hoo :~((

The birds are very happy though. They got an unexpected feast of plump
wriggly things .... I just got soaked to the skin, chilled through and fed
up for .. yup, bird food! :~(

I squelched my way indoors and hubby said "Did you get very wet, dear?"
Grrr!! It's just as well he made me a nice cup of tea :~).


I had the same problem with my Kiwi in the Spring. It was in a big pot
and I wanted to plant it against the house wall. Prepared the hole well
and took kiwi out of the pot - to find it crawling with horrible fat
things.

I spent a long time sifting them out to start with, but the main rootball
was quite tangled and I kept finding more - so in the end, I took the hose
to it and washed everything off - soil and weevils. I didn't expect it to
survive in the ground - but it has put on good growth and plenty of
foliage this year, so hopefully I got to it before too much damage was
done...

Not surprisingly there was no fruit - but then again it has never fruited
yet (Not sure how old it is - I've probably had it 3 years now, so
probably 4 or 5).

A propos nothing - we did have a fantastic crop of blueberries this year

--
regards andyw


It sounds as if you were lucky. If it's put on that much growth, the roots
must be okay. I'm not sure how long you have to wait for fruit on Kiwi, but
the pertinent question is 'do you get flowers?' If you don't, you
certainly won't get fruit. I'm assuming here that you've got one of the
self-fertile clones? Kiwi, generally, need a male and female plant for
fruit production. If you haven't got a self-fertile one (such as 'Jenny'),
then you will need a partner for your plant.

Another thought is that all is well .. you get flowers and fruit set .. but
that the embryo fruitlets drop because they're not getting enough water.
Many plants abort flower or fruit buds if water is scarce. Being on a house
wall, your plant is in a 'rain shadow', so you will need to give it enough
moisture to maintain and swell the fruit. A high potash feed, such as
tomato food, would also help.

Congrats on the blueberries. Do you grow them in pots, or is your soil
naturally acidic?

Spider