Having some free time around the holidays, I went for a search of male fig trees (caprifig). Luckyly I found four different varieties with plenty of mamme figs on them.  The wasp lives freely around here so  most probably these mamme figs are full with wasp "babies". I'll keep an eye on those trees next summer.


Last year I was taking some male figs (Fruits with emerging wasp inside) from a different male trees to polunate my smyrna type fig, but strangely these trees do not have the mamme fruits now.  Are there different kind of male trees or what?

Hi Pen,

I would be surprised if in your climate the wasp survives !? seems too cold to me.
Can you post a picture of what these figs look inside..?

Francisco

I am curious if anyone knows if you can keep caprifigs and wasps surviving in garage temperatures as long as it stays slightly above freezing, prehaps this would help for home garden caprifigs, but only those with greenhouses or lights,  I am amusing would be able to continue the cycle to have the wasps ready for their crops.

last year I shot this video, here you can see male and female pollinating and a non-pollinating wasps.
What I was wondering is why there is no mamme figs on the trees now durring the winter.

Sure you can keep your caprifigs in the garage. Last winter few nights temp. droped to around -20 celsius here and as you can see the wasp survived. :) I think some of the most cold resistant fig varieties live in this region around my home town, Stara Zagora. :)

Pen,

Your male and female wasp video does not show .... and I am very curious to see those insects.. pls
try and resend if that is possible

Yes, there are many Caprifig varieties, different sizes, shapes and colors
With your permission, let me show some of them and  as they look around December, ALL of the Mamme type, i.e., the 3rd crop.

The reasons for the absence of the Mamme figs in your trees may be due to a variety of reasons, namely weather, or a poor Profichi crop last Summer.. , etc

James, as I have suggested on various occasions, for the hobbyists interested on pollination of their few  Smyrna figs in hardy conditions like yours, the best option is to do it by hand...I know it is not the ideal procedure but it is a (simple) great achievement to see 3 or 4 of these figs - Bournabats, Bursa, Zidi, etc  being home caprified, witnessing their development and finally tasting and evaluating their superior qualities and the real 'crunchy' flavors.

I would recommend reading a very interesting small book: (you may already have done it)

- THE SMYRNA FIG -
At home and Abroad; A Treatise on Practical Fig Culture  by
George Christian Roeding

Francisco

Well it is from my facebook so if you dont have an account there, you can not see it!
Here I post it on my Youtube

[video]

Francisco, thank you for pointing the Smyrna book, cause, there I read, that the autor also observed  that some caprifig varieties to not develop mamme and mammoni crop, but only profichi

Pen,

Thank you for sending the video which I found very interesting.
No doubt you do have Caprifigs in your place and apparently it should not be a problem for you to pollinate the caducous (female) varieties.

My question now is: Have you managed to have your Bursa or other Smyrna like figs pollinated ?
It would be very interesting to have a Caprifig capable of producing at the proper timing sufficient Profichi with plenty of wasps and pollen in your climatic zone (6a).

On your video, let me comment as follows:

- At the very beginning those black insects seemed somehow bigger than our Blastophaga psenes...

- At 30 to 42 seconds from the beginning of the video to the left of the fig ostiole, there is a yellowish insect arching its extra-long ovipositor pointing it perpendicular to the syconium.. This is a clever parasite, female (machorro)..it does not enter the fig to pollinate and pierces through the full thickness of the synconium from the outside to deliver its eggs in the fig gall flowers, thus blocking the good pollinators to lay their eggs. We do have it as well and in some places may create a shortage of good caprifigs and wasps.

-To the end of the video the figs shown look very much like  one of our varieties (Val-Lois), the insect crawling on an arm do seem a true Blastophaga and another yellowish wingless insect could well be the male Blastophaga (?).
Are these the Profichi crop figs ? What time of the year?
If they are from mid to end of June..July, then you may grow Smyrna and have no problems to ripen them.. A lucky man!

Francisco

On the question of the discontinued sequence of the Caprifig crops

I agree with all remarks appearing here and there on the lack of some mathematical rigor on that sequence.
I get my Caprifigs from potted trees as well as from 'in ground'

Last year was fantastic with plenty in every of the 3 crops.
I did not witness but Friends said that the wasps were so abundant around the 20th of June that they exited the Profichis in dense clouds spreading through the fields and pollinating ALL figs.

By that time the small Mammoni were already in place and receptive, thus receiving full supply of new eggs for next generations.
This Mammoni crop is traditionally the most 'elusive'... on some years, even in big trees you cannot spot a single fig!! but,...

And this does not mean that it's the end of the world.. By October/November Mamme figs start popping all over the tree and given some time, you take a couple of samples and they are all full of larvae.
For me this is still a mystery..if no Mammoni available where the wasps came from ??

Three or four nights with low temperatures ( 0 to -6ºC) is enough to kill most of the larvae and/or wasps of the most exposed trees.

Already with a nice crop of Pofichi's promising plenty of insects and pollen... then an abnormal heat wave appears (April/May) with temperatures in excess of 35ºC...If the tree is fully exposed you stand a good chance of loosing almost the entire crop

This year, so far so good! there were plenty of Mammoni/Mamme in the fall, temperatures/humidity going as per mild figures..cross fingers!

Francisco

I am very curious about the wasps surviving in Bulgaria, it gives us hope in North America.  Do you do anything to protect your figs, which varieties do you grow, what cycles do you observe for the wasps hatching and pollinating?

Thank you for the like Francisco, I have not seen that book before I will have to read through it.

These videos were shot on the first of July. I took few of this profichi crop figs and leaved them near my Bursa plants. Some time later around the end of the month I was very happy to discover couple of ripe figs which were very tasty. Unfortunatly it turns out that the plants I got from a turkish nursery are not Bursa black, but some other green variety. I still have hopes for one of the trees that had no fruits at the time I polunated them, but I guess I have to search for another nursery to get a Plant or cuttings from this Bursa black. I hope the few people I exchanged cuttings with, are not very angry with me when they discover that. 
Yes Francisco this is exactly what bothered me too: if no Mammoni or Mamme available where the wasps came from? I guess because the wasp can fly long distanses that is how  the trees with only profichi crop are polunated. Somewhere I read that the blastophaga can fly distances of over 100km.

Here is a video on that non polunating wasp in action for those intrested.

Pen,

Thanks for showing the parasite video...They can be nasty if in great numbers.

Sad to hear that the nursery did that mix up ! I hope we can do something to straighten that up.
(will PM later tonight)

Between mid June to mid July is the time for wasp service on practically all fig trees around here and I also believe the same along the Mediterranean shores both North and South.
You right on the possible Natural developments to overcome some Caprifig poor crops. In fact if you are in a wasp environment the little insect, if conditions help, will find their way to the good Caprifigs.
For many years people thought their autonomy was in meters.... but as you said, with the 'good' winds thay may travel a lot and to find the receptive figs

Are your Caprifigs near the orchard ? If yes, certainly some of your figs were pollinated . You can get proof of this by doing that simple seed gravity (sink/float) test... now is too late, unless you dried some of those figs!!

Francisco

Hi Francisco
I want to hand pollinTe the incharios and need a manual... do you have any pictures of thehe
Proces?
I dont care doing it . I am used hand polinating my passiflora....
Is it hard? What is the success rate and is the quality the same as real caprification?

Hello Eli,

If you have a bit of spare time to read, try that Roeding book 'The Smyrna Fig' which is very interesting in many aspects of the subject, namely on what respects the very first successful attempts to perform hand pollination of the white Smyrna 'Lob Injir' or Sarilop,.. actually the Calymirna figs.

I have no pictures to show but will prepare a sketch to guide you through the process which is rather simple.

Once you need ripe Profichis to obtain the good pollen, at that time they may well be full of wasps ...? and if you take 5 or 6 of these figs close to your potted Smyrna, the wasps will happily do the job for you.
To your questions on the success rate, I must say that if you have plenty of pollen and manage to get enough inside the receptive fig you stand a good chance to get well ripen figs a month later or so.
A week/10 days after you did it, the fig will let you have sufficient signs of success or..failure

Anyhow, a sketch will be sent soon.

Francisco