I live in Seattle Washington where apparently for most figs, the growing season is too short. Several years ago, I received starts from Adriano in eastern Canada, of a variety that he was certain would like it here in Seattle. The tree grew slowly, and eventually began to produce figs, but they always gave up before they matured because it would be late october, when there is just not enough warmth from the sun here to mature figs.
So last year, I dug the hapless little fig up and put it in a huge pot, brought it in the house for part of the winter, and bought grow lights and set it in a window. So my artificial spring started about March; and the tree put on little leaves a full two months before the fig trees outside. Ah, i have an edge, I thought. So when all the outside figs had decent looking leaves on, I started exposing the tree to the outside world again, a few hours at a time, extending it. Alas, it HATED the exposure to outside and nearly all the new leaves shriveled and fell off. New leaves grew of course, and I left it out in the sunniest location on my property (against a south wall) and it made fruit. They did not ripen in time, so when the weather turned cold, I brought it into the house. The little figs just sat there for almost a month and then finally they started to plump up. they were almost ripe! but they never finished, so i started picking them. Some were moldy, others were just insipid, they hadn't gotten enough sugar. Does anyone have any suggestions on how I could have done this differently?