I have been noticeing small figs the last week or so appear on my trees none bigger than a real tiny small pea.
I know i know most have probably have grape size or much bigger but for me its a start finally in this cool rainy spring we been having so far. Hopefully they will do what they do each year mid to late August thru September and start giving me a smile as i start to taste them.
Best Health

Martin,

I have also been suffering with the cold and rainy weather. I have only a handful of fig buds on my trees. I was hoping for an early start this year, but it hasn't worked out. Hopefully when it finally warms up, it will stay there well into September to let the figs ripen.

I spotted this breba on hardy chicago plant also last week when looking at the plants more closely and it surprised me as i thought the unknown italian plant was only 1 with a breba, well thats a total of 2 i might get to taste who knows.

Dieseler
Your Zone 5 is better than my Zone 5 for figs main crop. I have been pinching at 4th, 5th or 6th leaves for the last couple of weeks but don't see any fig embryos yet even on my three years old trees (my oldest ones). I hope the embryos start showing up soon because any fig embryo showing up after mid-July will have no chance to ripen by the end of September when the ripening season normally ends here and cool weather and shorter days set in.

I am debating in my mind if it will be better to remove all fig embryos showing up after mid-July because these could not reach ripening stage and removing will help the tree health and vigour for the coming dormant period if not help too much in ripening of the figs left on the plant.

Ottawan what kind of trees do you have,you been pinching 4th 5th and 6th leaves already? I have so far 4 sets of leaves at most on mine mostly 3 sets and i will snip them soon at 4 and 5.
Also i keep my containers on cement patio or rock which heats them up as i think that helps a great deal keeping the roots and soil nice and warm i just have to water a lot when temps get hot.
We are going to have our first string of 80 degree days starting tomorrow as we have had not more than 2 in a row at best its been cool and in 60 and 70s so far although rather nice for sitting out on patio with coffee and pipe and enjoying the weather .
Summers though can be hot , lots of rain this spring including today maybe tommorw i post a few more pictures.
Oh before i forget for fishing puposes maybe not figs Canada cannot be beat from my 1 trip to Ontario back in 1980.
Fishing here is so so but nothing like i had and still hear about up in Canada and then there is the sport of Hockey my favorite sport but thats another story.........

Dieseller
I have Bifara and White figs from Grimo received in spring of 2007.
I also have Brunswick, Latarulla and Hardy Chicago from Grimo received in spring of 2008.
Others are younger plants rooted (survivors) in the spring of 2008 and 2009.

Today was the first day I noticed small fig embryos on some of the above plants. Some embryos are clearly fig shaped but some leaves have mini-pea size double bumps and I assumed one of these will be fig embryo and the other one a shoot. These embryos will have 100 days until the frost risk here anytime after September. I hope it will be enough for ripening if we have a normal summer. If I get enough embryos by July 10th, I will remove any that forms after that date. So the latest ones Will get at least 80 days of growth toward ripening. It is just a learning curve that will be helped by the maturing trees as time passes.

Ottawan,
sounds like you will get ripe figs . Only advice i could give and im sure your aware already is give the containers as much heat as possible if there on cement or rocks instead of dirt or grass in our climate it really helps them come along .
I also mix miracle grow and rain water when possible once a week at about 1/2 strength or so along with keeping the ends of branches snipped.
The one tree that does not ripen all it figs and leaves me a lot unripen it seems each year is my unknown as the figs are large so they just take to long to get ripe as i posted in past. My EL. Sals and hardy chicago do the best for me so far. Time will tell about the others i have aquired how they produce in containers in my climate like VdB, Portuguese, Ronde, Pastiliere and a few others but there to small for this year.