Travel & Leisure Facts and Notes

Figs are tolerant of many soil types but do especially well in moist but well-drained clay soil with a pH of 5.0 to 6.5. For fruit in the second year, buy trees 3 to 4 feet tall.

The handsome deeply lobed leaves, often used as a motif in art, are borne on thick stubby twigs; the trunks and branches are covered with pearl-gray bark and can become attractively gnarled as the trees become old. Most figs are brown, purplish or pale shades of yellow or green when ripe.

Mulch around newly planted trees with a 2- to 4-inch layer of wood chips or ground bark. The area under older trees can be planted with grass.

Established fig trees that have not been heavily fertilized will survive temperatures as low as 15 without injury, and in cold areas some gardeners protect the branches from freezing by encasing the trees completely in straw-and-burlap “mummies.”

Figs are seldom bothered by insects or diseases in borne gardens, but as birds are very fond of figs, it may be necessary to cover the trees with plastic netting to protect the ripening fruit. Figs should be picked when the necks of the fruit shrivel so that the fruit hang straight down; if white sap appears when a fruit is picked, it has been picked too soon. Figs for drying should be allowed to fall from the tree, at which time they will be partly dehydrated; finish drying them by spreading them on trays in the sun.

Fig trees produce two crops a year, one in early summer from buds on the previous season’s growth and another in late summer on the current season’s growth; occasionally a third crop is borne on the late summer’s branches. Fig trees may bear for 50 years or more, and a 15- to 20-foot tree ordinarily yields at least 40 to 50 pounds annually.