Hi Guys,

Been a while since I've posted. Hoping you can give me some advice on this. My first year potted figs went dormant as expected when the temps dropped into the high 30's. Mid November I moved them into the garage. No windows in there so zero light. Temps sit at around 50 to 55. I just took a good look at them and noticed almost all of them are now pushing out new leaves! What can I do? Its way to cold to put them outside. It will probably stay in the 30's at night thru February. Unfortunately I dont have any good spot indoors that geta enough light. Am I in a lot of trouble. I wasn't expecting the buds to break until Spring when I put them outside.

Thank you!

Get a couple walmart shop lights and grow bulbs cheep and it works. Been using them for years now for figs and citrus growing indoors.

I thought about that but my understanding was that leaves grown indoors under grow lights will die off when moved outside. Also, I doubt the lights I have are strong enough (six T8 bulbs) so I'd have to invest in something more powerful.

leaves grown indoor will die off if exposed to sun suddenly. problem in your situation is, there is no sunlight what so ever in there. so the leaves will be very pale and will burn up as soon as they go outside. with artificial light, it might help later. i keep my trees in garage and they get some filtered sunlight. they do rather well in spring against sunlight. i don't worry too much with my trees breaking dormancy since temp in my garage usually don't drop below 32 during winter.

I just use the cheep shop light, like I said I have for years. As pete said if you just move them from grow light to sun yes the leaves will die off then regrow. You just have to put them in the sun gradually wheening them from the shop light so to speak.

I use T8's and they do fine. You need a lot of them so walmart's shop lights at $10 and home depot's multi tube packs come in handy. :)

Ouch, that hurts.
Chrom: From what I have seen in past, ... When I was in Armenia they had fig trees there and , in Armenia, the winters are very cold and harsh. You would be surprised how much beating a fig tree can take before dying off... In your case- Your trees are not mature enough to hold so much juice in the bark to protect the entire tree from freezing and dying. And also, have in mind, Seattle has gentler winters than Caucasian countries. So, what I am trying to say is that, maybe you should try something like this: Take the thickest trunked tree out and berry the entire pot into the ground and see how it will handle the winter. If it makes it with minimal damage then you can put everything in ground and let them mature :)
And as for your thin trunk fig trees, I think you better get some serious growing lights ASAP, or? snip the tips and make sure you drop the temp of the garage further down. that will stop the growths and put the plants back to dormancy.
This is my opinion. 
Good luck and let us know how they come out of the winter bud.

if you want to duplicate sunlite, you need halide lamps. the expensive kind with a ballast, like the pot growers use.

you can grow anything with these.

How about doing it the lazy way and just snipping off the new growth and not worry about lights. My wimpy CA figs are dormant and it's in the 70s day/ 40s nights.

Thanks for all the great info guys. Looks like I have 2 options at this point. Option one, I move all the plants out of the garage to my dining room that has fairly good sunlight. Option two, I get a few more grow lights and hang them in the garage over the trees. Which do you think is better? I'm thinking the sun has got to be better.

How many hours of sunlight?

Probably 7:30 AM to 4:30 PM

That's pretty good. 

Thanks for all the advise guys.  Moved all the plants to the window.  House stays at about 68 degrees.  Even in two days the trees are booming with growth!  Leaves turned green and are growing fast.  Some are even pushing out little figs at a fast rate.  Hoping this weird timing I have going on doesn't screw things up for this summers growth.  Note in the pic that two trees (a VDB and a HC) never lost their leaves when the temps dropped.  Not sure why.

Chris,we are at the same weather predicment. What I did was I put a garden hoop house with regular plastic covering with the ends opened. so it gets light in, but it is cold, and will not heat up since the ends are open. I have some with green buds, most are asleep. I am by Northgate. My back yard is pretty sheltered from the winds.  I opened all and let some cold rain on them.. and cover again, so that snow and much rain, did not get to them.

I had mine out in my small unheated greenhouse until late November. All were in the same boat as yours. Once I was sure they were dormant and the colder weather was rolling in, I moved them to the garage. I was surprised to see them all putting out new leaves when I checked on them last week. No windows in the garage, so it must have been the sudden jump in temp, it's stays between 55 and 60 in my garage even though it's unheated.