Was preparing to starting putting away some of the trees for the winter,
been fairly mild in NYC and some of the branches have not completely hardened off.

 I let the trees have free reign this past season,
no pruning on my part, figured if the Mayans were right,
I would save myself some work  :-)

 Was only able to prune two yesterday,
Belleclare Kronos Sika/Syka and Belleclare Sicilian Turbinado
These cuttings are from those two mother trees

Inline imageRan out of time to continue with more pruning,
so I thought I would take a few pics of some mature Belleclare momma's
Sun angle, cluttered background, etc  all conspired against me.
Pictures don't due these trees justice or show proper scale.
All are 7 feet in size or taller with very large caliper.
Will try again in the spring when leafed out.

Belleclare San Piero
A beautiful specimen tree when leafed out, truly classical look to it.
Over 20 years old.
Inline imageBC Atreano, mother tree, 25+ years old
In the background  BC International Braided tree, 3 varieties.

Inline imageCloseup of the braided trunks fused together
Inline imageSorry the pictures are not that good.
I have a major root pruning and up potting project this spring
for all my trees, everything will end up in either 60 or 75 gal containers.
Have over 50 trees to do, in three different locations
so when I'm working on them,
I will take photos of each against a white background,
assuming the repotting doesn't kill me ;)

great  looking trees

good luck

I was taught not to put new lime on top of old lime,
so I left what was there for 2012.
Heavy lime has pros and cons,
one of the cons is soil compaction.
If you are following a regular root pruning and re-potting
schedule, this is not that much of a factor,
if you want to extend the intervals between re-potting,
heavy lime could become an issue, IMO.

I gave all my trees a break this year,
let them do their own thing
with minimal input from me other than water.
They did fine.

But vacation time is over for them,
this year I crack the whip !  :-)

With figs, you want to put some spacers between
the braids when they are young.

Yes, they are sitting on round concrete pavers.
Which is actually the item I have the hardest time finding in my area.
The shape and size is no longer popular with home owners for concrete work,
so the factories stopped making them.

They help prevent roots growing into the ground,
and the ground from potentially acting as a wick
and sucking the moisture out of your container.

For larger pots, I use heavy duty black plastic pallets.
I use these at two of my locations,
where their appearance is not a major factor/eyesore.
They do help with heating the roots early in the season.

I have tried many things,
for me, the best has been a narrow kerf chainsaw bar and chain,
makes quick work of root pruning and works great for wedge or plunge cuts.
It will make a huge mess and have a spare chain handy.

I would be happy to compensate you with dark colored ripe figs
for your photographic services.
But be forewarned,
you will encounter the dreaded white figs as well,
I have some in my collection along with some yellow and green ones :-)

Choose your varieties carefully,
you want them to all have similar growth rates.

Inline image

Attached Images
abraid.jpg (231.85 KB, 295 views)


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Big Apple/Fig, New York 6B

It takes me a couple of minutes to move the tree in and out every year,
and once every 3-4 years, an hour or so to root prune and re-pot (with help)

It takes atleast an hour or more to tie up and wrap a mature tree in the ground,
then almost the same amount of time to untie and unwrap the tree in the spring.
Larger the tree more time it takes.
Trees grown in tree form are also harder to wrap than those grown as a bush.

Over the past generation, tens of thousands, if not hundreds of thousands of
fig trees in the NY area have perished being grown in the ground.
When grandpa got too old to wrap his trees, and there was nobody to help,
they went unwrapped, a small amount adapted and survived,
but most died within a few winters.  Lots of unique figs that were brought to this
country were lost this way.

Containers are not a sure thing either,
I know a person in MA that had over 100 Belleclare trees,
all different varieties, they were kept in a trailer for the winters.
One especially cold winter there was a major loss for this collector,
only 4 of the varieties survived.

Off to prune and put away the last few trees for the winter,
weather pattern is chaning this week, old man winter is coming.
Maybe I will try to take a few more  not so good pictures  :-)