"Duncan Langford" wrote in message
...
With mucho thanks to Rick McGreal, five photographs of my fig-in-a-pot are
now on line at http://tycoonheaven.mynock.com/fig/

I'd greatly appreciate you experts casting a professional eye over them,
and letting me know what I should be doing to make it a happier fig tree!

(The shrubbery is a bedding plant I added to the pot on Wednesday,
following advice here; it's not a fixture, so if it'd be sensible to move
it...?)

All help and advice very much appreciated!

- duncan

(And thanks again, Rick)

Duncan,

missed this post because I was still watching the other one :-)

Generally the fig looks fine.

Fig 1 It is quite a bit smaller than ours, and so is smaller in relation to
the pot. You only seem to have two main branches.

Fig 2 Dead tip - this happens sometimes. I would prune back to clean wood
just above a leaf node (lump where leaf has been) and hope it puts out
another shoot or shoots.

Fig 3 That leaf looks a little burned but generally healthy - hopefully the
branch will grow on this year.

Fig 4 Nice new branch growing up - a good sign for the future

Fig 5 That looks a nice branch :-) The bedding plant looks happy as well and
shouldn't be doing any harm.


In general, though smaller than mine and with fewer branches, your fig looks
pretty much the same as mine with regard to leaves and stage of growth. The
only major difference is the lack of figs on the branch tips.

So - why are you not getting figs?

You have previously said that it grows vigorously but doesn't produce figs.
However it doesn't look that big - not like a tree that is growing madly out
of control.
I wonder, even, if it is big enough to support a serious crop of figs?
How old is it?
I also note that there aren't that many branches.
My tree seems to fruit at the end of the branches, so logically the more
branch ends the more potential fruit :-)

I find the information on pruning somewhat confusing.
Some places say it will fruit on this year's growth, others that it will
fruit on last years.
My tree certainly looks to be fruiting on last year's growth - leaves and
fig buds are starting at the same time on the ends of all the branches.
Going back to my trusty old 1975 version of the Readers Digest Illustrated
Guide to Gardening I read that fruit comes from the tiny embryo fruits
developed in the leaf axils at the tops of new shoots at the end of the
previous year.

I am very wary of recommending the hacking about of other peoples' plants,
but in this case I may be heading that way.

The picture I get of a fruitful tree is one with lots of side shoots, thus
lots of new shoots for figs to form on.

Looking at my fig it has five main branches each of which divide into at
least three smaller branches.
[15 branches, 4 fruits per tip = 60 fruits]

Looking at yours I see two main branches with no side branches (I can't
actually see the top of your tallest branch) plus a few small new branches
coming up from ground level.

One way to go would be to forget about figs for this year and grow for
structure instead.

Around late June early July I would pinch out the very tip of your second
largest branch (the left hand one in fig1) to encourage this branch to grow
side shoots.

I would also cut back the tallest branch (out of shot on all photos) so it
is the same height as the second highest - in the hope that this will then
start two or three new shoots to form a structure for next year. It will
also give a more balanced shape.

By this time you will also know if the branch with the dead tip is growing
new shoots.

If this works O.K., and the tree is still growing strongly, then next year I
would be tempted to pinch out the growing tips of the two remaining small
branches to encourage them to branch out into several shoots.

If pinching out only generates two shoots, then pinch out again the
following year (at least on the strongest shoot) to get one or two extra
shoots. At that point you should have four or five decent sized branches
which spread out to 12 to 20 smaller branches. This to me seems a reasonable
structure for a fig in a pot, and a good basis for future cropping.

It is a couple of years since I touched our tree but IIRC this is roughly
what I did.

I don't think you are over-feeding this tree.
It isn't trying to climb out of the pot.
If anything I would guess that it is not growing particularly vigorously and
needs to estblish itself more before settling down to fruiting.

From the various conflicting sources it seems that the key thing is to have
healthy growth and shoots at the end of the season - around
September/October - when the embryo fruits form in the leaf axils for the
following year.

I suspect that if the tree is starved of food or especially water in mid to
late summer this may prevent the fruit forming for next year.

Even so, a healthy tree should still form new fruit in the current year.
Our tree tries to crop twice in one year but hasn't made it so far.

Conclusion:
-----------

Grow for structure this year and feed the poor thing.
Give it plenty of water, especially in mid/late summer.
You could even top dress with compost or well rotted horse manure although
this may upset the 'starve it' camp.
If the fig grows large in the pot, it will use up the food and become pot
bound.
By all accounts this is what is required to make it fruit.
Once it is twice the size with four times the number of branches then you
can start the diet!

Cheers

Dave R

P.S. if it all goes horribly wrong my real name is Shirley and I live in
Canada :-)