Do any of you grow figs?

I've wanted to try growing fig trees for a while. I've read up on fig trees, but have never had any until today. I bought 12 clearance fig trees, that look really nice, at Walmart for $5.00 each. Unfortunately they are not labeled for variety. I would guess they are probably Celeste, Chicago Cold Hardy or Brown Turkey, but I don't know.

I would like to get a fair number of different varieties. What varieties do you like?

What do those of you that have fig trees, who live in areas with freezing Winter temperatures, prefer to do with your fig trees in the Winter?

Any growing tips?

Keith

Can't help you on your freezing temps but mine here is just now coming back from freezing to the ground for the second time in three years.

I guess I'm going to have use dad's trick of mounding pine straw around it come fall.

Mines an unknown as well but it most closely resembles Osborne Prolific/Neverella. It produces three crops a year but the third never matures before frost.

My last tree was Brown Turkey. When I was a child we had a tree that produced a white fig. Both are great.

Mine are brown turkey. Mine are also growing out from the ground for the second time in three years from freezing. I doubt you will have much luck with brown turkey figs. I have planted celeste a few times and they just sit there and dont grow. May be too hot for them

Did you know that a wasp has to die in the flower/bloom (?) for a fig plant to produce a fruit. Or something weird like that. My wife is big into insects and told me that. Strange...

Ol dad

That is right. Forgot that I read this before.

I’ve been trying figs here for about five years. I’ve mulched up in winter but the tops freeze every year and they start back from the ground every spring.

I don’t particularly care for figs but my dad had one planted on the south side of his stone built house and it produces a crop or two every year. Which the starlings get 99 percent of. A green fig. I used to know the name. I do know they’ve survived 12 below winters and not died back. Younger trees are more susceptible to the cold and Oregon doesn’t often get below zero.

I am in Zone 6B and have 2 of the Chicago hardy figs. They die back to the roots, so mulch them in the fall. They are slow to re-sprout in the spring, but they do come back.

I don't have any , but the old Italians all had some. Have no idea on variety, but they were grown on the south side of the house, and either the branches were gathered and wrapped with burlap, or a wire enclosure filled with leaves for winter protection.. This is zone 7A here. The trees never got real big, I'm assuming they were cut back so they could be protected.
Some guys would go to the effort to half dig and lay them down then covered in dirt....

Even so, I don't recollect big harvests, and there was usually some freeze damage, or even total loss.

The biggest fig tree I've seen was at the pioneer museum somewhere around Scottsdale AZ. It was at least 30 feet high and 60 across and had thousands of figs on it, I would never have believed they could get that big.....

I never read up on fig trees , but did on kiwi trees, or rather vines.
They would lay them down and mulch heavy for over wintering.
Like said in gcs's post , maybe that's a way to grow figs.
'

We love figs and have a dozen or more types.

I do enjoy tasting different figs and have no problems eating any of the ones we have as they’re all at least good when ripe. All of the types I’ve tried are at least tasty, but a few are on another level. These are my 3 favorites:

Smith

LSU Gold

LSU Purple



I enjoy eating figs fresh, dehydrated, preserved, and in baked goods.

I once read an article about fig types that were supposedly brought to the USA by Italian immigrants smuggling the fig cuttings into the country back in the 1800-1900s when they immigrated. They were so determined to bring a piece of their lives to their new home that they’d sew fig cuttings into their clothing so that they could plant them when they arrived.

I’m not sure how common that was, but I would think it happened quite often. People were doing whatever it took to make sure their family would have food to eat in their new country, not to mention the sentimental value.