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Breba formation

Will breba figs form without dormancy?

I have Norman's Yellow which has never had anything but breba crop. Suddenly it has several figs that are fairly large, which appeared in the last 10-12 days, They are forming at the base of the leaf stems. Her is the rub: we had 2 weeks of barely 60F weather in early June, after a warm Spring, and some trees started shedding leaves, a couple defoliated completely, and are now reflushing, and most stopped adding new leaves and are now growing vigorously again. So, if I assume that Norman's Yellow went "dormant" without losing the leaves, these would be a new crop of breba figs. If not, then it has a main crop for the first time in 5 (?) years.

Either way, it is behaving oddly.

Jon, A Fiorone di Ruvo did something similar here.  I had put it in my bay window after the holidays and it grew well and set two main crop figs while inside.  I took it outside and put it in a much cooler unheated greenhouse in the spring.   It had stopped growing while still in the bay window, and when it started growing again outside it produced figs on the wood that had grown indoors - and the wood still had leaves attached.  I think these figs are brebas.  They are now about the size that the two main crop figs were when they dropped.  Fiorone di Ruvo, being a San Pedro fig, will only hold them if they are brebas.  The unfortunate thing is that they are very close to ground level.  I’ve been trying to give them more room by bending up the branch and digging under the lower fig.  But even if they can’t ripen where they are, if they start to swell again, instead of dropping, I think that will prove they are brebas.

I’ve been thinking about the nature of brebas since you posted that you got “brebas” when you pruned back heavily on older trees.  That wood would have been years old – not “the wood of the previous season’s growth” as per Condit.  Now it looks as if brebas might form after a cool "rest period".  But figs' dormancy requirements are so minimal that the rest period might have met them.   I think there is a lot that we have to learn about brebas - and figs.

This is the progression of the possible Fiorone di Ruvo brebas.

June 12 - new growth, figs on "old" growth



July 2


July 9



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