In article , Spider
writes

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.

I'm pretty sure its a self fertile plant - can't remember the name atm.
To my knowledge, it hasn't had flowers yet. I wasn't expecting any this
year due to the evils. Past year or two I didn't expect much as the
plant in its pot had been pretty much neglected over the winter. Year
before last, I thought it was dead but gave it a chance and in spring it
burst forth.

I promised to look after it from this year - which is why I was planting
it out. Although close to the house, its well mulched and right next to
a major drainage channel that we put in to carry all the water that
comes off the clay of the hill. It also gets well watered and as of
this year, well fed


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

Bit of both - (pots and ground) but no naturally acidic soil. With the
two I planted out about 4-5 years ago, I dug a gurt big hole and filled
it with ericaceous stuff. It only gets direct rain or butt water, and
they get a lot of coniferous needles/leaves from nearby trees - and
regular ericaceous food and sequestered iron on top of standard growmore
dressings. To be honest, they don't seem to be plants that get really
upset by the soil acidity.

There are only two in the ground, but they are different varieties, one
ripening fairly early and the other being ready just before the first
starts tailing off.

The two in pots are the same age as the groud planted ones and have
performed nearly as well - they're already in biggish posts but need
repotting again

Also, this year, it was a bit of a (one sided) fight between me and at
least two female blackbirds. As the berries on the potted bushes
started to come ripe, the birds would fly onto the bush, pick a few
berries and drop them onto the ground then hop down and eat them. Then
repeat the process. For some reason, I let them keep doing it - they
looked so happy They also looked quite funny. Fully grown blackbirds
aren't the most elegant of creatures when manoeuvring through the
branches (compared to small natural tree dwellers).

Funny, but they didn't seem to do this with the planted out bushes. The
potted plants were on the patio wall, fairly close to the house - the
planted out ones are in what I'd have thought of as a much more natural
blackbird environment. Might be that the potted ones were riper earlier
when the birds really fancied plump berries.

--
regards andyw