Son had a big dog and this dog loves fresh figs. Dog love spending time in the house but when he is out in the backyard in summer he goes fig hunting. He has a passion for ripe figs. He is a Rhodesian Ridgeback and he is about a year old, very strong. Any deterrent suggestions apart from using the muzzle. I don't mind sharing the figs but in his determination to get the "about" ripe figs, he chew up branches or snap the branches by his actions. I have even seen him climb the backyard picnic table to reach for figs. 

How about soaking or injecting some fresh-picked figs in something unpleasant and harmless and letting him find them near a fig tree?

Paul,

Bear was a much better dog. Time to teach this dog a lesson

cayenne pepper on a few figs will work as a good training device. 

Plant him a Brunswick.  That's should be good enough for him.

Paully those ridgebacks are very strong willed yet loving animals.
Dont put nothing nasty on them figs to deter him he will still find and get the good figs on another occasion.
 Beside you dont want to make him sick.
If he is gonna eat figs plant a bunch of white figs in his path to fill his belly as they probably won't be missed.

Only "real:" option if possible is to cordone off the trees.

Otherwise that dog is just like many here and has a passion for figs it sounds like.

I'm lucky Butch never bothered them and now the 2 i have remaining are just too short to get at them.

My German Shepherd does the same thing...but he likes to attack the leaves. He does not bother any other plants, just the figs.  I have not had any fruit yet (plants are babies for the most part), so can't speak to that. I gave him a dried fig last week, he picked it up in his mouth and dropped it on the floor and kept walking.  Though, I will never forget last season when I looked outside and there he was dragging a 3foot fig tree around with him, container and all.  Tree was okay. He spent an hour locked in his dog house. He knew he was in trouble when I came outside because  he dropped the fig and RAN to his house. I got some bright orange web fencing out of the garage from when the kids were little that I used to block off the driveway/yard as a reminder of where NOT to go & curtained off the figs.  In 2012, they are getting fenced again.

Saramc...  I have a jack-a-bee that ddoes the same thing. She eats the leaves (which is really a bother early in the season as the poor figs are just starting to get leaves.

at least she's a small dog and can't really wipe out the higher leaves.

~Chills

All my dogs love figs, so I put a fences all around my figs..
This help..

I have 3 Chihuahuas and they love to rip off the leaves and chew what branches they can reach. I thought it was just unique to them but from what I read I'm not alone. Last year I put some cuttings in the ground to try rooting them and I found them chewed up on my porch. Apparently I'll have to fence off a designated "Fig Area".

I used to have a Doberman Pinscher that loved beef steak tomatoes. I didn't get a beef steak tomatoe from my garden the whole time I had him. He would pick them and eat them just as they started to get ripe. He also used to eat the rose hips off of rose bushes in the fall. I miss that dog - I'm sure that he would love figs, too.

Sturdy fencing and/or a radio fence are good options, especially for a small pup like yours. My Newfoundland Tank can climb or jump a 5' fence so I'd have to put an overhang on his side. Fortunately I can tell them to 'leave it' and they will. There's no dog like a Newf. :)

I had a large retriever and he loved figs. He would eat the ones on the lower branches, he couldn't climb up in the trees so didn't eat the higher ones. He never chewed the leaves, just sniffed and licked the figs. He could tell which ones were ripe and which weren't.

I've had friends tell me their dogs climb up into the trees. I guess about the only thing would be to try to fence off the trees somehow so your dog can't get to them, unless he can climb or tear down the barrier. I have a chihuahua and a shihtzu, and they both love figs.

Luckily my little pooch has not developed eating fresh figs yet.  

My dogs eat my guavas, strawberries, caneberries, lemongrass, tomatoes, peas....it's seems they only won't eat hot peppers. I put up wire mesh fencing around what I wanted to protect. That works for me.

My bichon also eat lower figs that it can reach to.
I had a larger American buldog ,that also like fig.
It seem all dogs love figs.

Plant him his own tree and show him he can eat that tree only. Otherwise try chicken wire around the others.

A single strand of electric fence baited with a fig.

I'm having a problem with my niece's dog.  It is a little mutt (looks like part yorkshire terrier) and it is giving me all sorts of grief in the field.  It frequently steals my water cups and soda bottles while I am working.  It goes into the field when I am not there and has dug up trees I have planted and pulled cuttings out from the propagation area.  It drags my tools to other parts of the field, etc. 

I am thinking about dressing it up like a rabbit in hopes that one of the predatory birds in the area can make a meal out of her..

~james

Lol James

lol James, my Yorkie will steal 1 glove when im in the yard and i just cannot catch him for the life of me.
Luckily he does not bother the small fig plants in gallon pots.