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first year rooted cuttings

I received some cuttings from two generous forum members last fall.
Here is the result.
1. italian white
2 excel
3 merdescola melanzana, or is it the other way around.
4 colosanti white


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and 5 colosanti dark
6 red sicilian
7 the "failed" cutting, hopefully hollier

I am happy that at least 3 of each, in most cases, rooted successfully as I have 3 separate and distinct areas to try them out in, a south facing wall, a flat roof and a 3 sided valley. Some varieties rooted more than 3, which I have given away to friends at work, hopefully to make a few more fig nuts.
The hopefully hollier was a surprise, cutting started Christmas eve, 2010, it rooted, leafed out, then crashed, only to leaf out and crash again, When I stuck it into the side of the larger pot, in mid May, it was soft and brown and had a bit of a bad smell to it. Then early july I noticed the leaves....  

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Looking good Grant, If you want different variants message me in the fall. Is that the sicilian red from our friend Mario?

Hi Nelson,
Thanks Nelson.
Yes the Sicilian Red is from Mario.
thanks for the offer, I will be messaging you,.... guess I will have to start 'working' on my wife now.
...... you know you are a fig nut when you look at one of your wife's roses and think, ...'that one never puts out any really nice looking flowers anyways.... it's too close to the house,,,, she probably wouldnt mind if I dug it out and put a fig there."   lol... fat chance.

Grant
z5b

My wife gave up. Says its my problem to find room. But, hey, its my garden. lol

Happily it looks like I will have lots of room.
I planted one grimo Natalina in the valley portion of our property to test for resistance to juglone toxicity.
Some kinds of plants will not even grow in pots, with fresh soil, if they are placed near walnut trees.

http://web1.msue.msu.edu/msue/iac/greentip/blackwal.htm

So far the plant, in ground, has shown no ill effects, no stunting, not wilting, no death.  Now it is just a matter of finding varieties that will survive with winter protecion and produce figs in my zone.

Grant
Z5b


Grant
They look great. They are a bit bigger than mine which I rooted in the winter as one would expect in your Zone 5b compared to my Zone 5a. Also, some of my new plants got a setback by losing leaves when the soil got dried unexpectedly in the heat waves we got. Not as much unexpectedly as procrastination in watering. The buds are green and they are expected to leaf out soon again.

Hi Akram,
Sorry to hear about the set back to your plants. Those young figs sure use a lot of water. I was following Dan La's recommendation/observation that young fig trees roots not be allowed to dry out, that they should be kept moist for first year or so. and while he was referring to newly planted inground trees in his area, seems to me the same would hold true for potted fig trees.  I was watering twice, sometimes three times, a day during the heat wave. I am going to try a more water retentive soil mix when I pot up. ... might be as simple as adding some coffee grounds to the mix. I've also put most of the potted figs into white pails as shown in a couple of the photos.

The merdescola melanzana and colosanti white were the most aggressive growers. I have removed a couple of main crop figs from them. So I am hoping for some figs from those two for sure next year.

The size of my now rooted cuttings varies, from about 8 inches up to four feet. So I am sure some of yours are bigger than some of mine. Hope your plants recover well.

Grant
Z5b

It puts me to shame when you write " I was watering twice, sometimes three times, a day during the heat wave. ".  I missed watering a day here and a day there and the plants show it.
I have a plant (SAL EL) in a 7-gallon pot. I topped the soil with home made Kitchen compost and a cantaloupe grew from seed in the compost. By the time I noticed it, it had 2" dia cantaloupe on the vine so I let it grow there in the pot. That fig plant is full of figs and really could use watering twice a day and more so in the heat waves we had (since the vine transpiring a lot of moisture). That fig really lost leaves due to missed watering days and the figs are nice and green but with no photosynthesis due to the absence of leaves it will exhaust its reserve and will have hard time for winter survival. But it is all "For Fun" and I do have a 2nd SAL EL so I will let it continue hoping new leaves will come soon.

Great looking cuttings !

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