Today I removed the last 277 figs from my Black Madeira. They will not ripen to anything edible at this point.

Thats too bad Jon, im wondering in your climate about how many ripened for you this season from tree and also how old is that tree.

Martin

Jon,
If I were you I would keep those hard green figs and make them into a very easy preserve.
here's the recipe Fig preserve

If your tree is mature,that tell me it will be a problem here in New Jersey to ripe figs.
But because figs are so hard to figure I am not taking this as a sure sign the fig need a long ,long hot season.
I might have to remove breba right away,to speed the main crop.
Also it can be kept in the greenhouse over winter to come up in the Spring with allready grown figs,wich will need just a little longer to ripe outside.
So for the money rich there is allwayes a way.
Best Regards

Herman i was thinking same way as my climate cold as well as yours. I bring in from garage in house by sunny window early spring to start then , then later time bring outside during warmer days and bring in garage at night, i will give this one extra care to see what happens. I here so much this is one of the better tasting types so i must try, same with Ischia Black if i could only get it to grow this sick one as i would love to compare the taste one day of those 2 types.

Jon when you have time how old are parent and its sibling please.

Martin

It needs a long sustained hot season. First cold days really affects ripening thereafter. They will still "ripen" but will not have the flavor and sweetness. I got it as an air-layer that was about 12" tall, somewhere around 15+ years ago. It is now about 72" tall, and will get pruned to about 36" in January. I had maybe 3 dozen good figs at the beginning of the season, before we had a brief cold snap in Sept that was enough to mutate the ripening process. I've probably had 100 or so "ripen" since then, though many have split. It is the King of Flavor, but quirky to grow and ripen successfully. I have a couple other varieties which may prove to be similar and/or as good, but will need a few more years of evaluation.