High hopes for this cultivar - Binello / Gallo ? - in snowy zone 6b. Put a rooted cutting into the ground last summer, spent the winter totally exposed on this northeast slope, -9 degree Fahrenheit days, total dieback to ground, yet now as a 1 year old small robust tree, 2 feet tall, it carries 16 figs:
 
 
Clone attempt on one trunk.

Cuttings came to me as Binello. Given that Binello is sometimes used as a synonym for Gallo, and given that Gallo is reputedly cold hardy, I wonder if it could be Gallo.

Good info on Gallo at Planet Fig:

• Gallo was found in an Italian village (350 meters of elevation) that is known for being cold and snowy during winter, in the southern part of the Alps. 
• This is a medium-sized tree, which produces few brebas, of medium quality, and an early and abundant main crop, at the beginning of September till the first frosts. The main crop figs are really small, but have fair to good organoleptic qualities. 
• In cool and rainy summers, Gallo is a type of tree, whose branches keep on growing until the end of the fall season, preventing main crop from ripening. Therefore, it is very important to pinch the terminal buds, when branches bear between six to eight fruits 
• It is also named "Binello" meaning "Twins" as main crop fruits often appear grouped together. This name is also used to represent Dottato, Kadota in the USA, and probably the only resemblance is the exceptionally heavy main crop. 
• This fig tree is interesting for its cold hardiness, early main crop ripening period and manageable tree size. However due to really small fruit size, this fig tree is abandonned.
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That's an interesting tree being so cold hardy.
Have you had a chance to taste the figs?  How small are the figs 1" or  less?
This year many in ground figs in Zone 6 and colder may not ripen too many figs so if Gallo manages to ripen some with a little pinching help of course then it may be a keeper. 

Tony, it looks like a great variety for northern areas.  The description refers to the figs being small but they look decent size on your bush.  Please post more on this when the figs are ripe.

This Binello / Gallo was a rooted cutting last summer when I put it in ground, and I don't recall that it tried to put on figs, so this summer's figs are its first I've seen, not yet ripened. Don't know how big they might be when ripe. Can say that the unripe figs are modestly bigger than all my unripe Mount Etna strains (HC, Gino's, MBVS Takoma Violet, Keddie, etc). And the B/G unripe figs are modestly bigger than my unripened Malta Black fruit, and about the same size, maybe slightly bigger, as my unripe Improved Celeste figs. Again, not clear what their ripened size will be, or if the eye will remain closed. (Their fruit stems are much shorter than Improved Celeste fruit stems.)

All the fruit was put on before I pinched any of the trunks. In fact, I think I pinched only the tallest trunk quite late. The little tree has not grown much at all in the last month or so but insofar as it has it keeps trying to put on fruit, which I pick off since it's getting too late to ripen. Again, this is a relatively neglected tree because it's virtually beyond the reach of my water hose, and it's on such a steep slope, a little dropoff, that it is difficult to build up much mulch around it. Mostly a clay semi-hardpan borders it on 2 sides and downslope where the mulch is thin.

Seems to be one of the most interesting cultivars to keep an eye on for these conditions, as a ground dieback fig, especially surprising to me as a light fig. I've now put a total of 4 of this type into ground around the house, though 2 are in marginal locations receiving only about 4 hours of sun per day. Only so much room, and tall trees surround.

So my Binello (and/or Gallo?) was one of the first ground die-backs to put on fruit this summer. However other ground diebacks that put on fruit about the same time or even considerably later have already long since ripened fruit. This Binello showed no sign of ripening, so about 10 or 12 days ago I stripped off nearly all its leaves in an attempt to hasten ripening. Sure enough, in a mere few days the lowest fruit began to swell, change color, ripen. Possibly decently edible now but am letting it ripen more fully.

     
More recently also stripped some leaves off another in-ground dieback bush, Mount Etna Unknown, below. Same result, within several days the fruit finally began to ripen. I left on far more leaves than I did with the Binello (though the leaves left on are out of the picture, above the fruit):
 
Did the same with Salem Dark in pot to finally get the fruit to ripen, stripped a few leaves, below. The photos show that I do not remove the leaf stem in the hope that the trunk might draw back some of the energy in the stem, or at least not bleed energy out through a tear in the limb that might occur if I were to remove the leaf stem at the limb joint:
 
Tried leaf stripping with a potted Conadria, below. Fruit did not ripen within several days but is now starting to ripen 2 or 3 weeks since stripping (when it might have begun to ripen regardless):
 
Tried leaf stripping with Aldo below, also 2 or 3 weeks ago. No fruit is beginning to ripen yet:
 
Hope to have flavor report on Binello soon. Will be my first and maybe only light fig to ripen this year after dieback to ground:
 
Tentative conclusions on defoliating fig bushes to hasten ripening of fruit: Seems to work for figs that are overdue. However, I doubt it can accelerate the ripening date much or at all ahead of typical ripening terms.

Very interesting and thank you. I noticed a fig grower in Malaysia strips leaves off also. I was curious why..

Tony,
Thanks for sharing your info and observations on leaf stripping.

IMO removing leaves is contrary to your goal and plant physiology. Also for those of us in colder short season zones pruning too many leaves to hasten fruit ripening may kill or severely retard the trees growth in the spring.

The leaves produce starches and sugars that are stored in the roots and fruits. The trees need the starches stored in the roots to survive through the winter and bud out in the spring. By removing the leaves near the end of the growing season, the trees will send the stored reserves to the figs. The tree will try to produce seed instead of keeping the starches in reserve for winter.
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I regularly prune leaves to balance the canopy and roots of young fig trees in the spring since reading that figs can leaf out multiple times in one season. In warm zones with long growing seasons removing leaves may only temporarily interrupt growth since they have enough time to regrow and there is no need for a long term reserve.

Pete,

Thanks for the perspective.

Partly defoliating early in fall for the purpose of hastening fruit ripening would seem to be no problem for fig plants grown in pots since I typically protect those plants from cold in an attached garage and prune the limbs over winter anyway, thus any depletion to the root area that may be caused by purposeful defoliation to hasten ripening should be offset either by the winter pruning of the top or by allowing for some recovery time in spring. So, partial defoliation may limit my future crop size, but at least I will have a crop. Defoliation may be the only way to get that crop some years.

As far as partly defoliating in ground figs, there may be no loss to the roots of significance, or at least that I care about. For instance, I defoliated the Mount Etna Unknown by only about a third or so and mainly only on the limbs with fruit. And some of those limbs (trunks) I am also ground layering. So, I will be taking those ground-layered roots (and limbs) away from winter and into attached garage where they can recover if not in winter at least in the next warm spring. The roots that remain in ground have the remaining leaves and trunks continuing to feed them. 

Additionally, this Mount Etna Unknown was still growing new limb and leaves, limb wood that would be lost to winter freeze, so by party defoliating it, I am preventing it from wasting energy at this late date on putting on new limb growth that it will only lose soon anyway, either to winter, or to my pruning, or both. 

And that goes for all my in-ground fig bushes. Until I might learn otherwise, I prune nearly all of them to the ground each fall, because they will die back to the ground anyway. Thus, they have a far more massive root structure than trunk (minimal, below ground or mulch) and limb (none). Consequently, they should and seem to grow back well in spring. Would they grow back stronger in spring if I did no late season defoliation to divert energy to fruit ripening. Probably. But if I don't get ripe fruit, there is no point in any grow back at all. They might as well die entirely and make room for more robust cultivars that can handle such treatment or otherwise ripen fruit.

The Binello will be an interesting test case because I defoliated it almost entirely, because it is one of my most exposed bushes, and because it is bearing such a heavy crop for its size this year. Given all this, I expect the bush to survive below ground this winter but would not be surprised if it cannot bear any crop or as heavy of a crop next year. I would also not be surprised if it then bounced back the following year to once again bear fruit. In that case, such bushes might need to be alternate bearing.

The other three main possibilities I suppose are 1) it could die entirely this winter, or 2) it could bounce back strongly and bear fruit as well or better next year as this year, or 3) the at this point unknowable possibility that next year, as an extra year older bush, the Binello might have handled defoliation in a way that it was not ready to this year as a 1 year old bush. We will see about the dying or bouncing back and be left to guess about the age question.

I also took a ground layer off of the Binello a couple weeks ago which I've potted up and which will spend the winter in the garage ready to be used as replacement if need be. Taking that ground layer might or might not be a significant issue for this specimen too.

I am punishing (by pushing) the Binello to get a crop this year, no question. We'll see if it can take it and to what if any degree in the future. Simply allowing this Binello to carry a crop as a mere 1 year old plant is no small strain itself, especially since it is destined to die back to the ground (or be cut back) due to the brunt of the oncoming winter. This year's unripe crop alone has severely limited the size of the "bush" (small plant really). But the crop appears to be coming in. Not bad for a few dollars worth of a cutting.

I did call this Binello "robust". Hopefully it continues to bear out. If not, I'll trying something else.

Tony,
Thanks for the reply.
I look forward to the updates on the Binello and the other cultivars.

Tony, have you noticed any flavor difference when the leaves are stripped? I'd expect the sugars to be diluted with less photosynthesis occuring.

Kelby, Short answer, tentative answer: no difference, at least that I can detect. Granted I haven't defoliated any bushes as much as this Binello, so will have to see how that goes. I have however been partially defoliating trees all summer, especially trees with unripe fruit, like one Mount Etna Unknown specimen in pot that bore 40 figs, many long since harvested. My main intention there was to get sun down to the fruit otherwise buried in a sea of leaves. Produced great fruit and still producing.

Went ahead and picked the first Binello even though not sure it was well ripe. It was. All sweet. Strawberry punch flavor, very good. Similar to the grape punch flavor that I find in Mount Etna type figs. Punchy but in the strawberry vein without grape mixed in. So this is no honey fig, no light interior. Sweet berry punch it is. A light skinned twist on a Mount Etna type fig. Plenty distinct in taste and leaf.

No downside to this fig and great upside given that it bounced back from ground dieback, no protection other than minimal mulch, fully exposed to the elements, near no structure, no boulder, nor cement. Receives sun until about 5 pm for most of the summer, on northeast facing slope. What a great fruit, could be a wonderful staple in cold growing zones.

 
 
 
 
 

Binello, interesting, looks nice. Congrats.

Yes it looks like a nice fig for those of us in lower numbered zones. I don't have the nerve to cut off so many leaves but maybe I'll try removing a few and see if it speeds things along.

By the way, I've read elsewhere on fig forums that exposing the fruit to sun hastened ripening (or conversely, that figs shaded by leaves take longer to ripen) but I've never tried this experiment myself.  Is this just based on anecdotal evidence or has an actual controlled study been done that shows that this is true?  Thinking about it from an evolutionary standpoint, I'm not sure why figs would have evolved a mechanism for speeding the ripening of a fruit if it is exposed to sun.

Wayne, thanks. Binello fruit does seem to have kind of an appealing blunt shape to it, to go with the great taste.

Steve, it seems to me that when figs are ripe enough to eat, if you remove a leaf to get the fig into the sun, it can nicely cook and jell and thus further ripen the fruit, so to speak, by heating it up. In fact I did that early today with a Janice Kadota fruit. I assumed it was ripe there in the shade of its leaf this morning but wasn't totally sure, so I put the fruit into the sun by removing a leaf. Several hours later the fruit was warm no longer cool to the touch and had changed shape visibly, noticeably softened and sagged, begun to wrinkle and all but fell off by itself when I barely moved it. In previous days though soft it had scarcely changed shape, it had held firmly to the limb, and it never felt warm to the touch. So the sun clearly warmed it and seemed to accelerate ripening, at least a little, though could be a coincidence. How could the heating not have an effect though, at least on fruit in the swelling and color changing stage?

I've seen some high fruit on other trees seem to ripen faster, when fully exposed to sun up top, than the older lower branched shaded fruit, although this could merely be function of the upper limbs' leaves getting more sun than the lower limbs' leaves.

Great info thanks for sharing. 

Some fruit, like pears, bananas, pawpaw and some mangos will ripen off of the tree.  Figs are not one of these.  Exposure to sunlight will change a fig's skin color even long before it's ripe.  And sunlight will evaporate water from a nearly ripe or ripe fig, concentrating the flavors.  But since a fig can't ripen off of the tree there's no reason to think sunlight on the fig will speed up the ripening of the fig.  Heat almost certainly will, but whether it's the heat of the branch, leaves and fig or whether heating just the fig will help it ripen is an unknown.  Rumor has it that Japanese men use scrotal warmers as a form of birth control and if so that device would be great to test the hypothesis that heating a fig will cause it to ripen faster.  I wonder if Amazon has them...

Bob, I'm not using the word "ripe" or "ripen" in any technical sense, which I don't know. The evaporation effect that you mention, and the heating up of the fruit, a kind of cooking, seems apparent to me that it does good things for the taste of the fruit (unless it goes too far). This direct sun effect seems to mature the taste of the fruit (or, going too far, spoil it). Whether or not this is technically ripening, again I don't know.

Maybe somehow related, recently I picked a couple of hard green Takoma Violet fruits curious to see what was going on inside. They had not swelled yet. The one, all green and hard, was white and dry inside. But the pulp was formed. All it lacked was color and juice. Swelling would have been a bonus. The other fruit, almost all green and all hard but with a small burnishing on one side of the eye, the color of a bruise but hard, it did have some purple color and juice in the center of the otherwise dryish white pulp inside. I carried it squeezed in my bare hand for awhile while watering some other trees, and then I noticed that I had warmed the fruit and smashed it a little so that the small bit of ripe pulp had smeared and run and looked suddenly like there might be enough there to eat, and there was, and it tasted good, like a bit of grapey Mount Etna fruit. And this in a hard small almost entirely green evidently unripe fruit that had not yet begun to swell.

If I had tried to eat the small purple bit in the center of the fruit before inadvertently warming it and smashing it over some of the whitish drier pulp, I wonder if there would have been as much there to taste and get the feel of. And I wonder if it would have had as much taste, or the same taste. Maybe the warmth and pressure of my hand did not technically ripen the fruit but maybe it did mature and expand it, in a way like direct heat from sunlight might once the fruit walls are sufficiently thinned, as opposed to, in this case, breached.