posted 13 years ago
One of the things I've read from a lot of people is that Hardy Kiwi vines, when allowed to grow up the trunks of trees, will eventually kill them, which obviously in most cases is a terrible thing. If one is establishing a food forest, however, and they intend to grow Black Walnut or blight-resistant American Chestnut on the eastern limits, after the trees reach a certain height they will begin to overshadow everything else regardless of where they are situated. Could you plant the Hardy Kiwis at the base of these trees when they reach a certain height, in the understanding that after x years, when they've just begun to cross the threshold into too-shady, the vine will start to strangle it and pull it down? At that point, the tree could be coppiced to start over again, correct?
Would the kiwis even be able to grow in the presence of a Black Walnut tree?
If this was even remotely feasible, what kind of combined yield could the kiwi vine and the nut tree produce? Would one neutralize the yield of the other?