Hey everyone

Welcome to the forum Eli,

I did almost the same thing with a couple of my prized figs this season too.
One started to re-grow the leaves about a month ago and the other just started about two weeks ago.

Hang in there and see what happens. Try to snip a bit off the top and give it a little fertilizer. But if you snip off anything see if it is dry. If it is then snip some more off till you get to the live part..

No need to have the dead part hanging around.

Good luck

Welcome Eli!

I second Rafed's advice. Cut it down until you see life, i.e., a ring of green called the cambium. If you do not find the green, then still all hope is not lost. You may still have live roots. You can check the roots and look for active growth. If you find it, great. If not, you can reuse the soil and toss the wood.

Hey Eli,

It looks like the cuts you have made were with a knife, and you sliced through the cambium layer, which would show you white wood or possibly pith rather than the green that you would want to see.  The wood you see underneath actually looked healthy to me (however, you now have a gaping wound on your tree ;))

Can you confirm that this is the case?  I say this because one end of the cut is rounded and the other looks squared off.

To see if it's green or not, take the knife edge (or a fingernail), hold it perpendicular to the wood, and slide back and forth, almost like you are scratching off the silver stuff on a lottery ticket.  With very minimal pressure and rubbing, you should see green if the cambium is still alive.

The cambium layer is between the outer skin and the inner wood of the fig.  It is the layer that provides nutrients to the extermeties of the plant.  This is the layer you want to make contact on grafts.  It is the layer which is removed when doing air layers, if I understand correctly. 

thank you all. much appreciated

Keep the soil moist but not soaked.  Leave the pot in a shaded area where you will remember to check soil moisture.  Give it 2-3 months to send up shoots.  If it does not, you could choose to give it a little more time, but ... I would probably toss it.

ok will do - so i guess i should cut it down to the roots - right?

It can't really hurt anything but I  wouldn't go that far (if it were mine).  I would leave 2-4 nodes exposed above the soil.  Nothing less than that, because if new growth emerges, it will be in the first 5mm-10mm above a node; leaving a few nodes would give it enough potential to grow back.  Nothing more than that because if the cambium starts sending nutrients over a hollow node (I've seen it happen), you have an instant weak spot in the tree which will cause problems later.

On Wednesday, I snuck in and took branches from a local unknown that defoliated and is clearly dying quickly - the fruit it good and it's an interesting tree that I've never seen much else like.  I have pictures of it somewhere here.  When I ran up, cut off a branch, then drove home, at home I realized the entire length (24") of branch was hollow and dried out.  The branch had a fig the size of a quarter at one end.  When I cut it, there was almost no sap flowing.  But it had a couple of 8cm branches about the thickness of a pencil coming off it which were solid.  So, it seems the cambium was carrying enough nutrients across the hollow branch to support these new branches.  When I cut the new branches and when I pulled off the fruit, sap oozed out. 

It's a testament to what these plants are capable of doing.

Eli
I sent you a PM to remind me in the fall to send you some cuttings.

It surprises me that the sequence of events you described led to this status of the plant. The only reason I can think is if the plant was not in adequate light condition when brought inside the house from the garage and it used the stored energy for leafing out inside and no compensation for the used energy/nutrients added by the plant inside the house otherwise when you took it outside in full sun and dropped the leaves then it should have got new leaves but there was no reserve left to do that. Also, a bigger soil mass in the pot helps create bigger root mass and moisture retention (helping in short vacations) and that is not what I see in your pot full only to half depth. Unlike some plants, fig trunks don't mind buried in soil above the old soil line. I really fill the pots to .75" from the rim.

Welcome to the forum Eli!

Yes, welcome. I hope your next plants prove to be a great success!

thank you everyone

Light is not critical during dormancy. Some people here leave their plants in the pitch black crawlspace of their home all winter with no illeffects. I kept mine in our basement garage all winter with zero light. Light is only needed for photosynthesis, and photosynthesis is only happening when there are leaves to capture light.

I think the three biggest threats during overwintering are (in order of worst to less worse) moisture control in the soil, common household plant pests, and temperatures being too low. The only reason I put temps at the end is because you can easily control temperature but you can't necessarily see a pest like a spider mite invading the terminal buds of your tree. Moisture control in dry spaces like a sealed basement is a bear. I had to add a little tiny bit of water to my trees every 3-4 weeks because the relative humidity of my basement is very low, it leeches water right out. Then when you add water you risk the fungus gnats taking over..... Ugh.

it's funny how i worry about fig trees. there are very few things i worry about. my family.. and that's about it. now i'm constantly looking at the fig trees. picking off weird looking things, cutting off leaves that looks like that might rot.. posting pictures if i think there is something wrong. i should start brewing beer again. less worry with beers.

pete

As I have learned over the last year, my fig trees have been pretty resilient. Other than rust and some FMV, they have been pretty good growers.

Eli,

Bullet, I have been the same way since I started. I go out and study my trees every little thing. I never remmeber ever waiting and stressing about spring like I did this year to see if my trees lived.