Hi Steve:
Your trees are beautiful. What other varieties do you have potted in the photo? Did you paint your pots that color? What potting soil are you using? Just curious. Feel free to write me off the forum. I have some other questions too.
Leon

Hi Leon,

This is my current container "orchard" Â from right to left:

- Italian Honey (2nd year),
- Texas Everbearing (2nd year  child of an in-ground tree I have had for many years),
- Violette Black (1st year)
- Sultane (1st year)
- Golden Alma (1st year)
- Celeste (1st year)

The current soil I use is not optimal  I travel a lot and need to have my trees survive being alone for 4-5 days at a crack. Using Miracle-Grow potting soil + Pearlite allows the trees to conserve moisture for these periods (together with burying the pots in the garden --- it helps a lot --- I dug a trench, set the pots and back-filled with wood chips.) My risk is root rot if we get wet weather --- so far I have been lucky. It is my intent to get a drip system tested this year. Hopefully, I will transition to drip + faster draining soil for next year.

I purchased the pots from Home Depot --- this is the color as purchased.

It is my plan to double the count next year. I have my eye on some additional offerings from Paradise as well as a number of juveniles in the nursery (just rooted this winter.) One of the most interesting cuttings is from a friendÂs tree on MarylandÂs Eastern Shore. I have not been able to type the tree as of yet -- it is a three-lobed leaf, medium sized, purple (I plan to post for comment pictures of the fruit next year --- hopefully.) The tree is quite old and was planted in the yard prior to her moving in. Why this particular variety is interesting to me is that the tree seems to survive the winters w/o any die-back, generates breba crops each year and finally has a tendency to be slow to leaf-out --- this tendency seems to allow it to survive late spring frosts. I hope this does as well in Suburban D.C. as it does east of here (the location of the tree is a full Zone higher as warm water of the shore provides additional winter protection.)

-Steve

{{gwi:762546}}

This is a very impressive collection of young fig trees! I'm also impressed at the size & number of your Italian Honey fig crop.

I have an Italian Honey fig too - no fruit yet but I keep hoping that some of the swelling buds at the leaf junctions now might be embryo figs. I think that our Spring is later so maybe that is why the tree is further behind.

Congrats on your handsome trees!

Steve, your plants are so vigorous and strong looking, I'm wistful. Do you add any fertilizer to the MG soil mix with perlite, at all? or do you water with any liquid fertilizers or additional nutrients? I've been seriously thinking to return to a higher percentage of regular potting soil in my container mixes because with the bark mixed in, it just seems as if there's a lot of nitrogen being tied up and nutrients flushing through instead of staying in the root zone. (Al, et al :), I know, I know - Turface is missing.)

I'm trying desperately to get several of my plants back into good health (they're yellowing in their leaves), and am aiming for ones that have the growth and deep green leaf color that yours have - so many of mine are sickly and not showing much growth (have barely added to their height in several years), that I know it's got to be a lack of something in their containers. Do you ever get any pests on yours? (something has been eating the leaves on several of mine, almost like a grasshopper or something else that's hungry enough to take the leaf tissue right up to the veins!). Please share more of how you're having yours thrive!

Sherry
(determined to solve the mystery of why some of her figs are so puny, and others are fine)

Your trees are beautiful. I'm also in the DC suburbs and have a few BT figs planted. The trees are big and leafy but no fruit yet. I honestly know nothing about growing figs and am hoping to educate myself by reading through this forum.

Sherry,

The MG has some time release fertilizer covering the first 6 months, after that I add Osmocote.

-Steve

I would disagree that your soil is not optimal. Your trees say otherwise. Very nice and healthy.

Sherry,

To answer your second question ... I have not had any problems with pests (bugs/animals that eat the plants/fruit.) I have been very concerned about deer. We have a herd that comes through each evening ... they hit my tomatoes hard but so far do not touch the figs. The squirrels have been annoying so far. They do not bother the figs, but seem to have a fetish for my labels and plant markers  they steal both (and the plant markers are a foot long!!!)

Going back to some pictures I took in December, while the IH was dormant, below is a shot of the small branch loaded with figs that was depicited above. Dormant, it was a simple 6" tip, now is has not only a number of brebas, significant new growth but a set of main-crop.

-Steve

{{gwi:789753}}

Lovely Italian Honey Fig! I am down here in Atlanta and I finally decided to plant mine in the ground. I placed in an enclosed backyard in a corner of the house. Hopefully it will be okay. I plan to cover/protect it when the weather drops too low. Does anyone know if an IH will make it outside thru 7b winters?

tiffaneyga,

I do not have an IH in the ground, but my father does (who lives in my area.) His died back to the ground last winter and last winter was very mild (no protection provided.) You should consider protection as you plan. A good data point for the south east is that Thomas Jefferson successfully grew Marseilles at Monticello (I believe IH is a synonym for Marseilles.) It is understood this was his favorite.

-Steve