This is for my mother in Tucson, AZ who does not have access to a computer/internet...

She is struggling to get this Peter's Honey going and looking for some advice please. She has a Texas Blue in the same area that is really thriving, so wondering if it's a species thing (not good for zone 9b) or something wrong with caring/maint.

Size at planting: 2.5 feet
Current tree size:  2.5 (same, no width/growth)
Age:  1 year old (since purchased/planted)
Pot/ground: In ground
Fertilized: Never.  When first planted, used 50% potting soil, 50% native
Watering: daily except none on weekends. Recently it's been very dry, so doing twice daily waterings
Sun: No natural shade, but installed a full shade cloth (50% reduction) to keep them from burning up
Leaves:  only has 5 green leaves, very small
Fruit:  Surprisingly, produced 5 figlets about 6 weeks ago but they all fell to the ground

She also has a shade cloth for the Texas Blue that is thriving, and waters it daily.  The only difference between the 2 is that she started using MiracleGro granules mixed with water (daily) on the Peter's Honey... good/bad?  
Shade cloth ok?
Should she fertilize?  Is so, how/when?
Other advice?

Thanks in advance!

I had a similar problem with my Peter's Honey in ground. I planted a Texas Blue Giant in ground 10 ft away from the Peter's Honey. Three years later the Texas Blue Giant is a 8ft by 6ft, very productive tree. The Peter's Honey was 1ft tall when I planted it, in 3 year it shrunk down to 6 inches, so -2 inches of growth per year..

I decided to dig it out of the ground and put it in a 5gal pot. Four months later it had grown 2ft taller and had 30 figs on it. I used Pro mix HP soil mix and nurticote 18-6-8 180 day, 1/2 cup mixed into the soil for fertilizer.

Both trees in ground had the same fertilizer, sun, mulching. I can only guess that, Peter's Honey is not a fan of heavy clay soils.

I'm not sure if your issue is the same. But another option I have tried before successfully, was to dig out the native clay soil in a 3x3 area by 1ft deep. and replaced it with potting soil. It seemed like that was enough to let the roots stretch out and the tree to become established.

Good luck.

Welcome to the forum!  All fertilizers have 3 numbers.  They represent the ratio of the major nutrients plants need N, P and K or Nitrogen, Phosphorus and Potassium.

10-10-10 is twice as strong as 5-5-5 but there can be a lot of differences between fertilizers even if they have the same 3 numbers.

Hi, is your soil a heavy clay?  If your tree basically lives in a bowl of good soil surrounded by concrete hard clay, the issue may be that the water can't escape.  With you watering it every day, the lower parts of the root system might be essentially drowing.  If a pot works, the next thing to try after the tree becomes healthy is digging a much bigger hole.  If you can punch through the hard pan and then add lots of organic matter and maybe a little sand to the soil, that might help.  God bless.

A few weeks ago, my PH tree had all its leaves turn yellow and drop off with a brief heat wave of several days. It has been in the ground for a year from a fifteen gallon pot. It did well last year and produced a nice crop of figs. Now around one third of the little figs have dried up but a number of them are still holding on. Digging down in an area close to the tree, I discovered that my daily hand watering was only getting down to around five inches in the hard clay soil. I put a slow, overnight drip from the hose on the tree once and green leaves are now emerging. We've had cooler weather since the heat wave so I haven't used shade cloth on it yet. I think its going to make it where it is but I still may have to dig it up and re-pot it as the summer gets hotter in the next few months. I plan on continuing to test the soil for deep moisture and repeating the overnight watering as needed.
We discussed it here with pictures: 
http://figs4funforum.websitetoolbox.com/post/my-fig-is-turning-to-yellow-8153135?highlight=yellow+leaves&pid=1292703173

I read somewhere that you can put a bunch of pine cones mixed in with the soil. This will allow roots to grow & extend easily AND, pine cones add some acid that figs love. Also, you may think about fertilizing with Epsom Salt. Here is an article you may like to read: http://backyardfruitguide.blogspot.com/2013/04/why-and-how-you-should-add-epsom-salt.html?m=1

Hi,
If the tree gets sun, temps have been over 20°C/68°F  and doesn't grow, I'd hit her with general fertilizer one closed hand or two full spread around the tree (every month).
Checking your dirt at planting time is important. If you fear that it won't be ideal than you could use a big container (like an 80 liters trashcan with bottom removed), bury the container and fill it with loam. That's what I do to help with my clay dirt and against those damn rodents. Did you check the area for rodent activity ? My first BT died from a tunnel coming from my neighbors garden ... nothing could be seen on my side ...

Good luck !

In a dry climate you can take a poste hole digger and did about a two foot hole near the tree.  It can be right next to a newly planted tree, but would need to be a few feet away from an established one.  And then insert about a four six inch wide PVC pipe and have it stick up out of the ground about three feed.  Then just fill it with water a couple of times a week, and it will slowly water your plant in a heavy clay soil.  It would have the impact of giving water time to soak into the soil of a drip system without the cost of one.  God bless.

Marcus

Apologies for the slow reply... I didn't get an email alert to the new posts in this thread.

@alanmercieca it's been in the ground exactly 1 year now and she has it sitting under shade cloth. Waters it daily except on the weekends (none). Not sure on potting soil, but she did 50/50 at planting. Tree is in Tucson, AZ so whatever native soil is there. She has 6 other trees (other varieties) that are doing well and produce fruit regularly

@jdsfrance she has a couple of cats that do take care of most rodents in the yard. Yard is about 1/2 acre and enclosed by an 8 foot fence.

@coolmantoole thanks for the tip on the DIY timed watering hole, that's neat! She leaves to go out of town every Friday afternoon and does not return until Monday morning, so it gets no water during that time, and this will help

A couple of things stick out to me ;

1. A 1 yr old plant in full AZ sun.  Poor thing especially this year.
I would put in a container in partial shade for a couple of years and then plant in ground then.  Making sure before hand to condition the soil like you would to plant tomatoes and ensure their is drainage so it isn't sitting in a puddle.

2. "she started using MiracleGro granules mixed with water (daily)"
the label on MG suggest 2/3x the rate required and to fertilize every day could have burnt the roots. 
For a 1yr old plant I would not use any no more than 1tsp/gal and fertilize on a weekly schedule after watering.  You may also consider using some compost tea that will provide amore balanced set of nutrients and not risk burning the roots as much.

yes, gophers, moles, voles, rats (I once caught all 3 in the same tunnel/gallery ) and the list goes on ...