This is the first year that I have tried to root fig cuttings and they have done very well for me, I think. Out of about 50 cuttings I think that about 35 rooted and put out leaves. A few cuttings are still just waiting to root but seem to be alive and well. But after potting up my first batch, a few days later, the leaves wilt and then the cutting dies. Thinking that the problem was with my repotting I have left the rest in their peat pots in 80% perlite. I was concerned about over watering so I wait until the leaves start to get soft before watering, but the cuttings in the peat pots are doing the same thing. I am not losing all of them but enough to be upset about. These cuttings are well leafed out and plenty of roots can be seen betwen the peat pots and the plastic cups they are in. My cuttings are on my porch and get early morning sun. This evening I came home to find a celeste and a negronne wilted. I have noticed that some of my cuttings are kind of soft (slightly wilted) in the morning when the sun is on them but then firm up in the afternoon. Any ideas?
Thanks
Susan

Hi Susan.  Sorry to hear this.  And since I don't use the rooting method you are using I will defer to my far more experienced colleagues on this.

I don't know what climate you are in, but if you live in a relatively mild climate (we live in Zone 7b) you could also try rooting some cuttings outside in ground.  Our method was to simulate the actual rooting conditions of a young fig sprouting from the mother plant.  So we dug a nice 4 x 8 bed on the south side of our largest fig, topped it with about 4 plus inches of good store bought garden soil (our soils mostly red clay) and put the cuttings directly in ground.  It's as easy as it gets, there is no transition from inside to outside, they seem to toughen up right away, and we have about 70% success overall.

If you have some extra cuttings next time and a good spot and moderate climate, it may be worth a try.

Best wishes.

John
North Georgia Piedmont
Zone 7b

I'm having the same problem, and my cuttings are in shade under a larger in-ground fig (they get little spots of light filtering down through the leaves throughout the day). I had 100% success getting leaves and roots, and moved the cuttings outside when I continued to get occasional mold and leaf-drop in the aquarium I had used to boost humidity. I surrounded the cuttings with a low fence of chicken wire and plastic sheeting to keep critters from eating them and winds from drying them out (open top), and they didn't show any signs of wilting at being moved. Most are growing well, and no mold has appeared since getting them outdoors.

However, every few days, for no apparent reason, a cutting will abruptly wilt and die, and I'm starting to get nervous. They're still in their bags (except for a few I rooted in soda bottle "pots"), and I'm watering every three or four days. They're in a light mix (mostly perlite, but packed into the bag pretty firmly) and the water runs right through. At first I thought the "sudden death syndrome" was happening right after watering, but now it doesn't seem to be correlated. I don't think it's too much sun because I kept some of them on an east window sill where they got the full blast of direct Tucson morning sun, and they seemed to love it.

Most of the cuttings show pretty severe FMV, but that doesn't seem to be correlated either. Several times now, with two bagged cuttings (from the same original "stick" that had been cut in half to double my chances) sitting in the same plastic pot (just to hold the bags upright), getting identical water and identical conditions, one will die and the other one keeps growing without a hitch--at least for now. Any ideas about why this is happening would be much appreciated.

Hi Ken.  Hope you are well.

We used the chicken wire too to keep the dogs, cats, and armidillos from digging up the cuttings.  Especially if you order a few rarer varieties, it doesn't take too much to get several hundred dollars into the cuttings, and having one of these critters throwing a middle of the night digging party in your fig bed would be a pretty awful morning after experience.  That's one of the potential downsides to inground cuttings, but the chicken wire works just fine.

Speaking of critters, hope you have not encountered any more rattle snakes.

Best wishes.

John
North Georgia Piedmont
Zone 7b 

John--Nope, no more snakes recently, except a friendly kingsnake on the back lawn, and they are always welcome.

When you root your cuttings directly in the ground (recognizing that you put them in a specially-prepared mix on top of your native clay soil), how do you separate them later, once you're ready to move them to permanent locations? I'd be afraid their root systems would become so intertwined that I'd kill them just trying to get them untangled.

I think I'm going to try moving some of my rooted cuttings (the varieties I still have two of) into larger pots (one-gallon milk jugs with a little plastic surgery) filled mostly with our native soil (if you can call it that) very sandy stuff near a wash at the edge of our yard, where the survivors will eventually be planted. If the Guinea pigs survive the potting-up okay then I'll do the others as well. It may just be that the bags I rooted in are too small (they're shorter than what Jon recommended), and that they need a bit more "foot room" to be happy.

Happy Fathers' Day, and good luck with your "fig kids" as well.

Thank you Ken.  And glad to hear that the only snakes have been the welcomed kind.  We have lived here for 10 years and the rat snake a couple weeks ago was the first one we had seen.  The boys and I (ages 11, 9, and 7), and my wife, are all hoping it will be another 10 years of so before we see any type of snake here again (not big snake fans).

This is my first year growing figs from cuttings, but I have rooted 4 or 5 layered branches together in a clump (held together and pinned down with wire and then covered with potting soil).  I did this late last summer and this Spring I had some really nicely rooted Italian Honey and LSU figs and gave some to neighbors.  It was very easy to untangle these, and they all did very well.  No serious damage in untangling.

But this is still an experient with the cuttings bed.  My plan is to over-winter then in the cuttings bed, with some protection, and then when I am pretty sure the freezing weather is over, put then all in the long hedge bed permanently.   I will prepare the full hedge bed this winter.  I did a short part of the hedge bed already as a test bed with some of the Italian Honeys and LSUs and they are doing great, even setting some nice figs their first year in that location.  So I am hopeful but I will keep you posted on progress.

My general approach to gardening is to try to do things are naturally, simply, and inexpensively as possible, letting the plants do the work when we can.

Hope you are well my friend, and hope your figs are progressiving nicely this year.

Best wishes.

John
North Georgia Piedmont
Zone 7b