Hello fellow fig-lovers, I am in the process of planning a fig planting on a piece of property I own in Limon, Costa Rica and I was hoping to hear the input of forum members with some experience of growing common figs in tropical climates. The following link has more in-depth information on climate in the area.

- https://weather-and-climate.com/average-monthly-Rainfall-Temperature-Sunshine,Limon,Costa-Rica

One of my main questions is the timing of the planting. I will be in the country in late December of this year, which seems to be just before the start of the rainy season, which I would imagine is a good time to plant trees (please correct me if I am wrong in this assumption). I was planning on taking or mailing fig cuttings from my current small collection (shown in my sig), is this a suitable plan? Will these varieties of fig perform well in tropical areas? I see people from Hawaii on here, its not quite Costa Rica but zone 12 or whatever seems to be pretty close. Also if I take dormant cuttings from my figs, will it be a problem that the cuttings will not have had a long dormancy period? I currently grow figs in Zones 6B and 8A, so the cuttings would be from wood that has only been dormant for 2 months or so. If anyone feels that they have some helpful advice please feel free to chime into the discussion! Thanks everyone,

Aaron

Hi...

Lot of people are growing figs in tropical climate in Malaysia and Indonesia. I also have a small orchard in Malaysia... And another one in Hungary :)

So basically figs do not require long dormancy. But at the start of the rainy season I withhold the fertilizer for a few weeks to let them 'dorming' a little bit. They will drop some leaves and after pruning they are more prolific then.

Will you grow them on a hillside or a plain? I grow them on a lowland plain which is a bit waterlogged but I asked to local bulldozer/excavator guy in the village to make drainage and a pond at the end of the site which I put some catfish in it and pump the water for irrigation.

Hello helike thanks for your response. I have both hillsides (not too steep) and bottomland plains available for some planting. If I feel that there might be drainage issues in certain areas I may utilize some swales to improve drainage on the planting. Can't wait to get some trees in the ground, I think it will be fun to see how a clone from my fig trees grows in a drastically different climate.

If you will have a nice collection of UCD varieties I can trade with you for some European varieties and flood-tolerant tropical rootstock :)

So by the way... If your site is rectangle you should make drainage on the left-right edge of your area there and a pond at the end to drive down the water (parallel to the hillside). And you pump back the water from the pond for irrigation in the dry season. The excavated soil you top up to the site and spread out nicely.

For in ground, it is all about drainage. I have raised beds of topsoil and stone. If water puddles, especially more than 24 hours, it can rot the roots, the trunk will turn black at the soil line and the tree will die.

I have 300 trees on flat ground, but it is ripped rock 6ft deep, so there is plenty of drainage.

Pick varieties with closed eyes and are resistant to splitting in rain.

My top two for rain resistance are Conadria and Flanders. I picked figs off both of them throughout the rainy season. With nearly 24/7 rain for 30 days straight.

Peter's Honey is pretty good with the rain, but takes a long time ripening.

I like the Mt Etna types, Hardy Chicago, Sal's/EL and MBVS. They grow fast and produce large crops of figs. They can handle light rains.

I'm also growing figs under rain tarps. That can expand what figs you can grow to anything common.

Good luck

Thanks for chiming in everyone, I'm really looking forward to testing the tropical waters of equatorial fig growing. I think I may look into the possibility of some raised beds to help improve drainage. Even if my planting this winter is unfruitful, I think it will nevertheless serve as a good opportunity to scout out the site in more depth, I am young enough that I hopefully will have many more opportunities to plant. I am definitely going to do some reading on moisture-tolerant figs, its my understanding that most of the legit LSU releases were selected for closed eye to prevent souring, so I think that I will look into adding a few of those. Happy figging!