Day 260: Students, please take your seats and prepare to take notes. Today, you will learn several new botanical terms as they apply to Actinidia arguta "Issai," also known as the hardy kiwi. If you have encountered it in nurseries, you may have noted that the tag refers to it as a "self-fertile female" vine, capable of fruiting without benefit of a male. Actinidias are dioecious, which is to say that male and female flowers appear on separate plants. Most require both sexes in order to fruit; the exception is Hardy Kiwi "Issai." Gynoecious plants (those with pistillate flowers, i.e., females) will form seedless berries without fertilization. This is known as parthenocarpy, and veg gardeners may recognize the behaviour if not the term if they grow seedless cucumbers. The principle is the same.
Personal footnote from the Professor: I have loads of flowers on my Issais! If the squirrels don't get them this year (I think I've successfully relocaed 95% of the population), I should have lots of little thumb-sized, fuzzless, seedless nibblies from the two vines covering the trellis gateway to my "Berry Pen." If you can pass the test for botanical vocabulary in a month, I might be willing to share.
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