do you "pinch" the trees? have the leaves changed color?

No, leaves the same. Maybe one or two yellowish ones.

Your figs are young and you must have had same drought as I had the past 6 weeks.
My Celeste inground ,3 of them all dropped some fruits,and also one other young cultivar,that did not drop last year dropped a few fruits,this year.
I think it was lack of water at the time when it needed it.

The same is happening to mine . All the figs are puckering . My friend has the same problem. I water regularly --she lets hers dry out --but the same prob.

Waaaaa.........

Wonder if it is too hot for the figs?

We had 90's all last week. I keep my figs in some shade, but mostly sun.

Yes lack of water combined with ,young tree with lack of roots,plus added heat= dropping fruits it can't sustain.

Herman2 nailed it. The same thing is happening to my younger trees. My three oldest trees were totally immune until......

I pulled up their pots and cut the roots coming out of the bottom of their pots into the ground. Most of the roots were pinky to thumb size. I buried the pots 6-8" deep with a 4-6" mulch ring the same depth all the way around. I thought planting them in the ground would keep them cool enough and moist enough to compensate for the loss of roots. After all they are all in 15 gallon pots. Wrong, wrong, wrong. Now the fruit is drying up just like the smaller younger trees.

Once your trees root systems are large enough (Mature) the fruit will stop drying on the tree. Give them another year or two and all will be well.

I'm in Southeast CT. The same thing is happening to my figs, Shriveling, puckering, some have colored up but are spongy and inside is undeveloped. Some trees have dropped the fruit. It has been very hot here with very little rain. Some days have been over 100*. Lawns have dried up. I have watered daily, some times twice a day. The odd part is the young trees are doing better than the older ones. One older tree has over 60 figs and they are puckering too. The trees themselves look healthy. The fruit has baked in the intense heat before it had a chance to ripen.

I started out with the best main crop ever on about 60 + trees, all in pots. By the looks of things I'll be hard pressed to get any to eat at all.

Last Summer was cold and wet. This year we were jumping with joy because it was warm. Too much of a good thing. All in the life of a gardener!!!

Peg

I have my young plants on a drip system the large pots 5 gal get 1/2 gal in the morning and 1/2 gal in the evening my 1 gal new cuttings get 1/4 gal morning and 1/4 evening, even when it rains.. they are doing well alot of people are scared to over water their plants. If your soil is well drained you should not have an issue. (container plants) I have not had an issue with shriveling fruits and some of my trees are from this years cuttings with figs on them.

I'm in the same boat, and pretty disappointed, but last year when I planted my fig, I didn't know about container soils or anything, so it got a mix of our clay soil and some peat. Maybe a kiss of perlite. NOW I know the error of my ways. My fig is on the drip system and gets plenty of water, but that water is going right down the sides, and out of the container, and not getting to the roots.

I hear you can't transplant mid summer, so I'll wait till dormancy, then give it the nice container soil it deserves. Meanwhile the plan is to stick the Soil Sleuth into the soil at various angles, pull up that bad stuff, and cram some moisture retaining vermiculite mixed with turface down into those holes.

A soil sleuth is a cheap plastic notched stick that captures soil when you turn it a quarter turn. When you pull it up, it's easy to see the condition of the soil. It aerates the soil too, but now I'm going to use it for multiple holes to insert better soil just for the time being.

I feel bad about this, but I learned that ignorance is not so much bliss, now, is it? :-)

Suzi

desertdance be yea careful with Al's gritty mix in the desert. Make sure he knows about your challenging climate as there will need to be some adjustments. A lot more bark for instance. I love his mix though as it allows you to water as much as needed to keep the roots cool on a container grown tree or plant. You can't really over water with any version of Al's gritty mix because the water won't drown the roots.

My fig tree was planted in ground 7 years ago as from a seed. It grows to about 8 ft now with strong main trunk and beautiful form. First fruits came out in 2008 and shriveled at the size of a quarter. Last year, same problem repeated when the fruits were about small eggs. This year, hundreds of fruits start shriveling in June and some fruits are as big as large eggs.
I am in San Jose area (N Cal) with pretty warm climate. I have no clue why. Is 7-yr still too young? Please help.

Your fig needs polination,but even with,being a seedling It could be inferior in taste,as most seadling are,to mother tree.
Some could be so bad to taste sour,or cardboard.
If you want a tree in your area contact Jon,at fig4Fun,and he will sell you a real cultivar adapted to your climate.

It's a hard pill to swallow, but sometimes you need to bite the bullet, and kick something to the curb. I heard somewhere that fig wood is good on the BBQ.

My suggestion is to get rid of that tree and put in a varietal that will thrive in your climate.

Sell the chopped off wood as BBQ Bliss on ebay!

Suzi

I'll get slapped for saying this, but I should be in the agriculture forum, and that does not exist.

You want figs? Then buy a branded tree or root a cutting from one. One that is cultivated and suited to your climate.

So live with your monster unproductive tree and don't buy an branded tree, and whine forever. These are your choices

Both my mom and mother-in-law have this problem with their volunteer trees. Their trees produce beautiful dark figs in June but the insides are completely spongy and dried out. Don't know about my mother-in-law's, but my mom's got a second good crop in September/October. She's in east county San Diego and mother-in-law is in South Bay area. I live in Ohio, so am not familiar with what is viable here...just remember two green and one black fig we had in Los Angeles that produced fabulous figs year after year with absolutely no care whatsoever...go figure. Any suggestions? Thanks in advance.

Your fig needs polination,but even with,being a seedling It could be inferior in taste,as most seadling are,to mother tree
=======================================================
Herman what does that mean? I thought polination is for trees with flowers. Fig does not produce flower. please explain
abe

Fig Fruits are inverted flowers.

Certain varieties of figs need to be pollinated by the fig wasp in order to produce fruit that will not fall from the tree. To be successful, do what Herman is telling you and get a known type of fig that produces edible figs without having to be pollinated and you will have fruit that is good. That is how it works.

Figs have many seeds in them and not all of them are going to produce edible figs and any that are will most likely need pollination by a fig wasp. There are so many easier fig trees to have, why go through that and only end up with inedible figs?

noss

Two questions need answer please.
1- I have brown turkey, Celeste and Chicago hardy. Are any of these three kinds need pollination.

2-One of my brown turkey is carrying too much crop. I left it alone. Some of these figs are becoming spongy. Watering is ok Water every other day. The sun is adequate. from my reading the posts I am thinking the reason for being spongy is too much figs for the tree to Handel. If I hand pick the spongy ones the tree will be relieved from them and it takes care of the rest which are firm ?
Answers will be appreciated.

If you water,and they still become spongy,that is a sign your tree needs pollination.
No matter the name of the fig.