[snowdrops]

I'd be interested in a couple of fig cuttings if there were any available? tia
 

Pm me your address & I'll try to prune this week & send you a couple. I will just place the cut end in a bag of compost to keep moist then you will need to pot up yourself if that ok. We have the house on the market & I don't want loads of pots of cuttings around, plus they took a good year last time until they were ready to pot on individually.

[New shoot]

You could restrict the roots to keep the fig dwarfed.  They are trees that benefit from some restriction on root growth, or they put all their energy into growing branches and leaves, not fruit.  You could sink a big pot into the ground, or line the planting hole with paving slabs.   

You can prune them quite severly as well.  I worked on a specimen tree nursery some years ago and we had a very large pollarded fig shipped over from Italy - pot was about 250L, but the poor tree looked so hacked back.  It sent out loads of new branches and we were eating fresh figs off the tree for weeks that summer 

[snowdrops]

They used to say plant them in an old Gladstone bag sunk in to the ground or line the planting hole with slabs. Mine is currently in a raised planter, must water it more though

[Kristen]

Thread goes back a long time, but I don't remember reading it before ...

My view is that Brown Turkey is commonly available in UK, its rock hardy, but I think the flavour is disappointing compared to other varieties (although still probably like night&day fresh from the plant, properly ripe, than bought in the supermarket ...)

I'm growing Rouge de Bordeaux and White Marseilles which are reputed to have much better flavour.  I bring them in for the winter though ... not had any fruit yet, so can't tell you if they actually taste better

[Snoop]

OK, I know this is going to be a very controversial question, but I'm going to ask it:

Do fig trees need to be taken in over winter?

We hit perishing cold temperatures here (down to minus 17 ºC, not including wind chill factor), we get just about all our rainfall in the autumn and spring, and we regularly have snow in winters (enough to snap pine trees and olive branches under the weight). Just to give you an idea of how long our cold season is here, I usually start using our wood-fired range from late September. In the case of last year, we used it right through till mid-May. And we are surrounded by fig trees, most of them self-set. They don't seem to be at all bothered by the cold, wind and wet.

They also grow in the ground, obviously I guess. Personally, I'd go with pigguns' approach and leave them outdoors in the ground and save my back! For a good crop, just prune back severely and hope for sun in the late summer.

[Kristen]

Do fig trees need to be taken in over winter?

Brown Turkey is very hardy ... only other issue that I perceive is that Fig trees make figs over a prolonged period, and cold kills the growing fruit - so if given protection they will grown on those embryo fruit, and provide fruit over a prolonged period (I think?) whereas if subjected to a cold winter then the only fruit will be those that ripen from Spring to Summer (presumably more in Spain than UK as hooter / longer summer??)

[Snoop]

Thanks for the reply Kristen. I've been told that sometimes fig trees here will hold tiny fruit over till the following year, but I've not seen that (been here eight years now). When it does happen, apparently, the fruit are ready for picking in July. There's also another variety that bears two crops, the first of which is relatively large fruit followed by smaller fruit growing in exactly the same place, ready for picking about six weeks later. So staggered harvesting, rather than one long season.

So far, all I've seen is fruit developing late spring and then reaching picking stage early in September. They don't all ripen at once, so you can pick them over three weeks or so.

It's cold here at the moment (ice a good two inches thick and more in places in our water barrels and assorted buckets and tubs). But I can see that our fig tree is getting ready for spring already. I've seen bigger fig trees than ours even lower down and on the shady side in our valley, where it is much, much colder, damper and no direct sun till much later in the year, and they seem to do OK.

[Kristen]

I've seen bigger fig trees than ours even lower down and on the shady side in our valley, where it is much, much colder, damper and no direct sun till much later in the year, and they seem to do OK.

Can you get a cutting off them? Sounds like they are a variety well suited to your local conditions

[Snoop]

Can you get a cutting off them? Sounds like they are a variety well suited to your local conditions

I could, but I'm keen to get a cutting off another tree that has really fragrant figs. I don't think the tree owner would be too pleased, even though he doesn't bother with the figs himself.

Mr Snoop likes taking the dogs out for walks and scrumping for figs on the way, so too many trees at home would rather defeat his object!