I have some figs growing in 5 gallon pots with holes on the sides that I partially bury in the ground each spring. When I take them out in late fall, I cut off roots growing out of the holes. Can these root cuttings be used to propagate fig trees? If so, how would I go about it?

Greetings Figger

This has been discussed many times here on the forum, and the general consensus is no. Last year I had a massive root structure, planted it in a pot, it stayed fresh, but no branching. Apparently there are two types of plant cells, those that produce roots, and those that produce the branch,tree part. Your roots just won't reproduce into new trees. But, since u have them give it a go, you might get lucky!

From reading on this forum as well as from other reading and from what I heard from an oldtimer growing figs in his garder for over 30 plus years, it does happen that left over roots in the ground would sprout a new plant shoot. However it is very rare occurance. If I remember correctly that can happen when the root was quite shallow, exposed to light and has developed a latent but.
After cutting the palnt of the root that latent bud awakens and forces a shoot.
i am just passing what I read/heard. I have no personal experience neither knowledge, therefore
correct me if my understanding was not right.

Damir

No! But you can graft another variety onto the established root and give it a good head start.  I have one black madeira that I dug around the tree, found a goot finger thick root, cut it and dug some more enough to expose the piece for me to work with, I grafted,covered with a bottle with no bottom and put lots of wood chips around covering everything, and just a little hole of the top of the bottle for me to inspect. I put a cap on and more mulching... it stayed all winter, and  grew beautifully.  Now it is completely covered again with leaves inside of a large plastic bag... temperatures are freezing... crossing my fingers that it will make it.