Hi All,
Apologies if these questions have been posted before, but i've searched around with very little luck on detailed information.

I am growing two fig trees in Saratoga, Northern California (west side of San Jose), both in 20" pots for the nextcouple years before i transplant into the ground in a permanent location.  The Black mission is the larger one (on the right) - 3rd year?  The Adriatic is in its 2nd year i believe (on the left).



I transplanted these about 3 weeks ago, with nothing more than a one time use of Tappin Roots soil amender upon transplant, and an every-other-day dose of Tappin Roots all purpose fertilizer/water.  I have some Tappin Roots Solid Bloom but have yet to use any on them yet.  The trees took the transplant pretty well it seems, both doing very happy and many new buds forming since.

The black mission has two figs already going (started before i received the trees), roughly about the size of a quarter.  The Adriatic has just started to bud right after the transplant.  I have not yet done any pinching as I'm waiting until they grow a bit more to shape the trees how i see fit.

My main question is about pulling the leaves off around the newly appearing buds (which over the past two weeks have really been getting going).  Should i be breaking the leaves around the buds off?  Both trees have a solid amount of leaves on them currently, as you can see in the pictures, so could maybe benefit from some thinning? 

Without knowing if i should or not i pulled the leaves off directly under two of the new fig buds to see what happens, pictured below.  Should i keep doing this near all the figlets?  Wait until they're a certain size first?

Other Question would be around the Tappin Roots "solid bloom", has anyone else used that in the early stages of the fig?  I'm thinking of giving it a try while they're starting up.

Adriatic;




Adriatic New Bud (with leaf recently broken off just below it);




Black Mission Early Fruit;




Black Mission New Bud (with leaf recently broken off just below it);





Thanks All!

I heard that removing leaves on branches would encourage early ripening of fruit.
I'm interested to know, where you read about this as my pruning/pinching and root pruning was done during dormancy and this season, after three years, it appears that it did encourage some aggressive growth.

Ok. This is a fun experiment to try. On one branch pinch off the terminal green bud off. Not the leaves but just the end green bud. This forces the branch to make figs. Figs need leaves so you want at least 5 leaves on a branch before pinching. Really does work. Bloom booster is a good added effect too

Put em in the ground right now if you have room, and let them go without pinching or pruning any more this year.  They'll do fine in your climate.   And once released from pots, they grow amazingly fast.  In a couple of years you'll have some nice large trees and  more figs than you can eat.