Let them ripen longer on the tree. ;-))

Joe, thank you for showing us this video
These are great figs
Congratulations

Francisco
Portugal

thanks joe

I would want several trees as well if the fruit tastes as special as people universally report.

What kind of protection does the tree get in the winter? At what point can it survive on its own in your experience?
I live in zone 9b, where it sometimes get as cold as 23 F for a few hours and want to plant this variety in ground in a season or two. I want to minimize killing it when the time comes. Any advice from your experience is appreciated.

The coldest that its ever gotten in the 6 years that I've lived here has been the upper 20s (very briefly before sunrise). And thats rare. Most winters it doesn't drop below 30. Im in zone 9b. If it can drop into the low 20s where you live then it sounds more like 9a.

But even here some of my fig trees have suffered frost damage. Frost even killed my young China Honey tree last winter.

The only protection that i give my fig trees is to encourage them to go dormant in the fall. In October i start reducing the irrigation and i stop irrigating usually by mid November. No fertilizer after early summer.

Dormant, hardened fig wood can easily survive temps into the teens and even lower for brief periods. The best thing you can do is encourage the fig trees to go dormant before any winter frosts set in. That way they are able to protect themselves from the cold.

All that being said i have never had an issue with frost damage on Black Madeira. Usually it is the more vigorous growing varieties that suffer frost damage because they want to keep pushing growth late into the season and get caught by a frost.

Ok. Thanks. In this case, Black Madeira's slow growth turns out to be an advantage. I'll try to ween the figs and harden them early this winter.

My area is classified zone 9b but last winter something happened and I had two days of low 20's temperature for a couple hours before sunrise. Now the sun is burning tree leaves like crazy, even with the increased rain. Go figure.

Awesome video, Joe!

Great video! That's my favorite fig too.

Thanks!