It won't hurt them to over winter them in your sun room. Most figs will still fruit even if they don't go dormant. I kept mine under lights one winter with no negative results and they all fruited come summer.

My understanding is that the tree has a clock. Regardless where you keep it has to go dormant. It is better to leave to go dormant and don't fool eith mother nature.

As the fall approaches, let it drop the leaves as normal, give it a little rest (a month or two) in dormant mode in a safe place avoiding very low temperatures (say under 23F. Then bring it to your sun room to restart the next cycle.
That is what I would do with a couple of 0f plants if I had a suny room like yours.

Regardless of what we have all learned.

It appears that figs do not need to go dormant/lose their leaves to produce fruit. Figs are being grown on farms in Hawaii with no chill where they are harvested year round. Just like chill hours for apple trees are off. Applenut (Kuffle Creek) on the Fruit and Orchard forum has been growing apples regardless of listed chill hours in Z10 with little to no chill hours for years and years. 1600hr chill apples produce fruit without dropping leaves in Z10 right next to low chill apples. Figs that don't lose their leaves produce year round in Hawaii.

Wake up people. We don't know squat yet about plants and the facts are changing all the time. They even have a No Chill Stone Fruit project going in Hawaii.

We've had this conversation before, and you're just as guilty of a hasty conclusion as those who claim unequivocally that figs need a period of chill/dormancy. :o)

The need for a period of chill/dormancy is not necessarily determined by species. There are several species of trees that are capable of growing in tropical areas with no period of dormancy and in temperate parts of the world, protected by dormancy and subsequent quiescence until temperatures increase to levels that stimulate growth. Ulmus parvifolia (Chinese elm) comes to mind immediately as a tree similar to F carica in that regard. Both cold-hardiness and the need for a period of dormancy is an individual genetic trait in carica, not an 'across the board' species trait.

Provenance is a practical consideration for all trees. Those trees evolved in southern provenances that grow and fruit well near the equator, along with their vegetatively cloned offspring, are unlikely to grow/fruit well or survive freezing winters in a colder, more northerly provenance. Conversely, those trees and their clones that grow and fruit well in a more northerly provenance, when moved nearer the equator are unlikely to grow or fruit well and likely to go into decline, or even eventually die if deprived of a cold, albeit short rest.

Al

Well Al you were wrong last time and you are still wrong.

Ken Love and all the farms now growing figs in Hawaii from cuttings received from UC Davis I'm sure would disagree with you too. If they were taking your advice the No Chill Fruit Project never would have started and it has been a resounding success.

For sure fruitnut who is the owner of Kuffle Creek would disagree with you when it comes to apples. He has literally grown hundreds of northern varieties under no chill conditions and has over one hundred growing at any one time. So far he has not found any that did not fruit under no chill conditions.

In both cases some varieties faired better than others or the fruit tasted better than others. A few fig varieties did not thrive in Hawaii.

Nearly all deciduous stone fruit appear to need a certain amount of chill hours to fruit but even there are a few exceptions.

I have posted a video on how to harvest figs several times. All the healthy trees in the video are from a zero chill area in Hawaii where the figs are harvested all year long.

My understanding is that the trees do go dormant for 1-2 weeks every two to five years.

They look healthy to me.

I have always been of the opinion that someone with personal experience is not at the mercy of someone with book knowledge. Ken Love and the members of the No Chill Fruit Project have personal experience and so does Applenut and he is working with UC Davis and Dave Wilson nursery.

My personal preference is to agree to disagree. However in this case I will agree with those who have copious amounts of personal experience growing and helping others grow under no chill conditions.

Take a look at the Kuffle Creek Videos and see for yourself. The varieties that have been northern varieties grow right next to the southern varieties and produce large crops.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5jwtYhS2Qcs&feature=related

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dxL1F0I6ltE&feature=related

Here is a link that might be useful: The Fabulous Fig

Hmmmm - I saw 2 videos about apples & one on how to pick figs. So we disagree.

Al

It's an interesting issue, no matter which side of it you happen to be on. Here in Western Arizona, some of my trees are putting out new little figs and leaves and new growth as we speak. Last winter my trees kept many of their leaves, which remained green. We had one 4 hour period where the temps dropped below freezing last fall.

So...did they go dormant? Partly dormant? I don't have an answer for that one....

Al the video on figs is a farm that is a participant in Ken Love's Hawaii no Chill Project. If memory serves she says she harvests year round in Hawaii.

If you look at the Youtube page with the fig video you would see that it is posted by "HawaiiFruit". HawaiiFruit.net is host to the Hawaii No Chill Stone Fruit Project and were also the first to introduce commercial production of Figs in Hawaii.

If you look at Ken Love's page entitled "Figs". In the paragraph on CULTURE there is sentence that reads.......

"A 1/2-gallon per hour emitter for 10 minutes a day in the early morning insures constant production at 430-foot elevation. At mid elevations, 600 to 900 feet, trees will produce 2 or more crops per year. At elevations above 900 feet trees usually produce 1 or 2 crops per year."

I think constant production speaks for itself verses the 2 or more crops at higher elevations. The trees that go dormant produce crops as in one two or more crops while the lower elevations produce constantly. Ken does not think its earth shattering that figs produce all year round at the lower elevations so he does not harp on it. However he does make mention of it in a sentence here and there throughout the many other pages he has published at hawaiifruit.net.

The two apple videos are from Dave Wilson at Kuffle Creek in Riverside California. He states the chill hours for each tree they sample and says it should not be happening here; meaning they should not produce fruit here. The planting is in a micro-climate and in most years his trees do not go dormant. He has said so himself many times in the Fruit & Orchard forum.

Here is a link that might be useful: Figs By Ken Love