Green Gold

Day 322: First frost missed me by a scant few miles and about 200' in elevation. For cryin' out loud! It's still August! It's way too early to be thinking about frosty nights! I don't recall that we've ever made it all the way through September without a frost, but neither do I remember it happening so close to me in what is historically our hottest month of the year. The occasion inspired me to prune back some of the kiwi foliage so that maximum sun will reach the berries, and in so doing, I discovered a few more on the east end of the tangle. Kiwis are vigorous (I repeat "vigorous") vines and need to be trimmed three times a year to obtain maximum yield. That said, "maximum yield" for me this year will be roughly 10 end-of-thumb sized fruits, as delicious as their large, furry cousins. Why so few? Cold nights persisted into late spring, and if that wasn't enough, they alternated every few days with temps at 90 or above. The poor vines didn't know if they were coming or going, and only produced a few blossoms.