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any info on Lampeira?

francisco, 

thanks for the tip. since i don't have any tree that i keep for the breba crop, i prune my trees hard every winter. i'll make sure i don't do that with Lampeira Preta. Breba crop comes from the previous yrs growth, so if i prune hard, i won't get any breba crop. :)

Yes Harvey, you lucky man, already in FIG Paradise,  and to get best of both worlds
Fellows Dennis and Pete still in a mild FIG Purgatory ...but I feel moving in the right direction !! I hope, one day they will overcome.

Francisco

I would think both Pete and Dennis could grow some caprifig with wasps with some protection.  I wonder if they are figaholic enough? :)

thought about that for awhile.. i need to understand the fig wasps better. what they do during the winter.. than again, that might be introducing alien insect population in NC.. not sure how that will go down. 

Pete, I don't believe the wasps have any other hosts.  They are true figaholics, lol.  The wasps just over-winter in the form of eggs in the mamme crop.  I think you probably just need to keep them from getting colder than maybe 20F which we see here in some years.  Right now we have the profichi crop starting to form, about the same timing as the breba crop on common figs, and the wasps will emerge from the mamme and move into the profichi in maybe a month and then when the leave the profichi in June or July they doing their fig sex help.  No training required, they know what to do!  One caprifig I collected recently (I'm calling it Chinatown #1) is very productive.  If it proves to be a good host it might be able to provide sufficient profichi (wasp hotels) on a single stem.

it sounds like it's possible to have one or more caprifig in a container and treat it just like the rest of the common figs. over winter it in the garage or somewhere the temp won't go down too low. take them out in the spring and have them have their wild party. there are people who are keeping wingless fruit flies to feed their poison dart frog.. if protocol for keeping fig wasp can be made, it sure sound like a possible solution to less than paradise in this country. 

Harvey, I pretty much the same boat as Pete.  In other words, what's the difference between Profichi cuttings and Male fig cuttings?  Aren't they the same?  I have a nice large  Zidi fig tree.  I want to use it as a pollenator. 

This year, I'll be making 2 trips to CA.  I'll be in San Deigo the last week of June.  And plans to meet up with Jon in August sometime.  Harvey, let's talk off line via email about the profichi/male figs if you don't mind.  My goal is to get 4 or 6 Profichi fig trees and winterize them inside my garage.  I also have plans to build a 34'x54' GH to house my container trees.

Francisco and some readings and close observation of a caprifig firsthand last year are my teachers, but I don't claim to be an expert.  But here is what I know.  At this time of year, the caprifigs (here) are without leaves and they can be spotted in the wild easily as their branches have plump figs on them.  These are the mamme crop.  These figs have wasp eggs on them which often can be spotted as off-white galls inside the fig if you cut open the fig.  Right now, in my climate, the profichi crop is also forming, seems to be about the same time as breba on some of my common figs.  The mamme crops function is simply to serve as a place to hold the wasp population until the profichi are ready.  The profichi are the most important crop of caprifigs.  In maybe another month from now (in my area) wasps will emerge from the mamme and eggs will get laid into the profichi.  Again, in my climate, wasps will emerge from the profichi in early July (late June near Fresno, I believe).  The profichi have pollen and the wasps leaving these figs will venture out to other trees and perform caprification.  The next step remains a mystery which Francisco said people don't know what happens.  On my closest caprifig which I successfully used to caprify Marabout c. Smyrna (very successfuly with just a couple of fruits about 2 or 3 times, a week or two apart), I see no mammoni (the third crop) on the branches when the profichi drop around August or so.  I do not know where the wasp population resides for the next couple of months.  I don't recall specifically when (chestnut season keeps me very busy, remember), but maybe around October the mammoni crop forms and these simply serve to hold the wasp population over until the mamme are ready.

One might be able to get profichi with wasps in them from other areas but I think the timing will often not be correct so I think it's best if folks try to grow their own if they can keep them from getting too cold.

The fig wasp is not considered a pest and USDA does not regulate movement of the insect.  One official in another state had told me to obtain a permit from APHIS before shipping wasps to her state back east.  When I told her that APHIS officials told me that the wasp was not regulated, she dug around for a while and saw that the caprifigs could harbor fusarium wilt and that California has a regulation that requires that the mamme be picked up from the ground to reduce the presence of this pathogen so that they are not spread to commercial fig crops which can lead to spoilage.  So she said that she wanted a phyto on any profichi shipped to her state to help protect her state's non-existent commercial fig crop.  This was not be feasible as the profichi would be dried up and the wasps gone before my local ag officials could send off the profichi to a lab to be tested.  As it is, fusarium wilt is already abundantly present in our environments.  Nobody picks up any mamme figs from the wild trees around here, including my neighbor's tree that I used.  I experienced no spoilage other than over-ripe figs becoming sour (I can't always keep up, no matter how hard I try!).

Once a wasp enters an edible fig it is believed to never leave and is absorbed into the developing pulp.  Compost fertilizer, of sorts.  Their wings reportedly often fall off when they squeeze into the eye of the fig.

Another mystery to me is that once my Marabout c. Smyrnia were caprified in July I continued to harvest ripe fruit from maybe late July or early August into late October.  I don't think that the fruits that I picked in October would have been developed enough at the time I placed profichi amongst the tree so I don't understand how they were caprified.  Maybe they were, in fact, receptive in July and just take longer to develop and ripen because of their location on the branches.

Vista split on my least year for the first time that I remember and I think it was probably because it is more sensitive to excessive pollination.  Maybe 25% of the fruit split on me.

I thought that the wasp could not survive in our climate...

ok, let me summarize it. there are three crops in caprifig. mamme crop, profichi crop, and mammoni crop. after that i'm lost. but it seems only females can fly. males just mate, tunnel through the fig for escape route for the females and die. they don't have wings in most cases. once a female enters a fig, it will lose wings and most of antenna due to struggle to get through the eye. once they lay egg, they die there. 

does that mean, every time they move from crop to crop, they lay egg and die? meaning each time they enter next crop, they are new generation of wasps? 

Yes. 

To make one more point, I am pretty sure they do not lay eggs in anything but caprifigs.  They fly out and search for a male to mate with but don't find one in anything other than the caprifigs.

Gloria, that is true.  BUT one could pollenate by hand (or wind) with a pollen filled figs.  If one had a complete enclosed GH where the inside temp is not cold, the "wasp system"  will work well in our climate.  I am working on this.  Just need to get my wife her new car.  :)  Then I'll get my huge GH.

Thanks for the clarification Harvey.  I think I understand now.  Time to make a few calls and resubmit my APHIS application.  I did this years ago but did not keep every thing current.  Its' really a pain in the but!  You have to keep your ID and Login active every 2 months in NC. 

Good thread!  Great education!  thanks everyone.  Jon needs to pin this thread.  Hope he's reading this.

Dennis, why not just add one more tree to your shuffle population that you keep in your garage?  I don't see why the caprifig and wasps would not survive there.  I don't know what the lowest temperature they can tolerate but we had about 45 nights with frost this year and get down to the low 20s at least once every ten years and probably have been down to 15 or lower in my lifetime.  I remember as a teenager discovering I left my work jacket on the hood of my pickup early one morning when it was 17F.  That was nearly 40 years ago but helps remind me to bring in my jacket! :)

at least here, we typically will go down to 20s, occationally into 10s if winter is cold one. but in my garage it's usually 10-15 warmer than outside. if fig wasp and caprifig tree can handle low 30s, it should work here.

Harvey, Congratulations..

This is a nice piece of information and education on the fig pollination mysteries for all of us.

When Dennis mention to use his Zidi tree as a pollinator, I assume he intends to graft a Caprifig pair of buds on it ?? Am I correct ? - Zidi figs have no pollen

I would like to add that in this business,  the poor wasp does not care at all about pollination !
It is just and only interested to lay its eggs and give birth to a new generation of wasps.

The pollen thing is a cruel trick from Nature !!! abusing of the voluntary services of this inoffensive insect to vector pollen inside all other figs

Francisco

So, it sounds like my winters would be fine for the wasp but how hot can they take it in summer would be the next question. I wouldn't want to cook the poor things.

Also, would one have to buy a tree with the figs holding the wasp for the next year already on it?

Let the wife get her new car, then explain that in order for her to park in the garage, you'll need to build a biodome in the back yard to house your fig wasps. Win-win. ;)

i read you just hang a branch with profichi near the tree you are going to capricated. wasps do the rest. but to perpetuate the wasp population, you will need a caprifig tree near by.

what i'm trying to figure out is what do i do with a caprifig branch that has mamme crop on it. do i root the branch and get more mamme next yt? or is there way to keep the fig wasp and the mamme going until the branch roots and put on the profichi. same question if i have a branch with profichi.

Hey Pete! A caprified fig taste so amazing! Figs are larger, richer, sometimes sweeter! Just imagine!

It does seem like some figs are improved more from caprification than others.

Pete,

Hanging a branch with profichi on the tree you intend to pollinate is the OLD, and comfortable system, but this meaning that you will be destroying your Caprifig.
Better pick the Profichi figs when ripen, string them and position on the tree.

Air-layer shall be the method of establishing a Caprifig with the least disturbing of the natural crop sequence.

I would start 'practical work' this season doing a dozen or so, of hand pollination on some of the best Smyrna you may have plus some Common or
even getting a dozen of good Profichis and give them a taste of your selected figs

Ripe Profichis may stay live in the fridge for well over a week !

Francisco

francisco, thanks for the information. i think my best bet is to root the caprifig this season and see if i can get that going. once the tree is going, i can try to get some mamme/profichi to see if they will occupy my trees. it will be very interesting few yrs from here on : )

hmm.. i need to make sure my wife doesn't find out about this. as it is, she won't touch the figs if there are ants around. if she finds out fig wasps entered the fig and died there, she will never eat a fig again. :) 

How on earth will you be able to keep her from finding out?

Pete,

What she doesn't know won't hurt her. Just tell her the crunch is from the seeds.

And agree with her,,, yes it is juicy.

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