in this Texas Spring there are quarter size brebas on the leafed out Brown Turkey (it came with the house...) and the Negronne but the Marseilles VS and the Peter's Honey hardly have leaves on them. Galbun cuttings are potted up, out of the greenhouse and growing like krakens. Anybody note any correlation between hardiness and time of emergence? I suppose this is more a plants in the ground question.

AB, I also have trees with large figs on them and I have some that have just opened buds and I have some all over between these two extremes. My Cajun Gold was the last to drop it's figs and leaves this past winter and the first to put out leaves and figs this spring. My Mead, which came from the northest kept bearing late into the year (november) but was the last one out of 50 to leaf out this spring. My Marseilles VS was one of the later ones and Peters Honey came in in the middle of the pack. Maybe over the years I'll get a better idea. I agree about the Gilbun growing like gangbusters, and the "Otto" Celeste are really pushing roots like crazy. Oh, and my Cajun Gold and Mead are in the ground and my Marseille VS and Peters Honey are in pots.

I used to grow in containers in Houston and now grow in the ground just north of Austin.  In both instances, most trees would leaf out within a three week period.  Where I am now, all of my trees die back just about to the ground in the winter.  This makes it difficult to judge cold hardiness.  Also, some come back from the stump just above the soil line, others come from below.  There were times I wondered if a tree was dead when I needed to wait for it to break the soil surface.

Having said all that... this year, my MVSB (or is it MBVS?) was the first to show signs of breaking dormancy this year.  It sent out a sucker (based on angle and distance from trunk) from about 1.5" below the soil line that broke the surface almost a month before anything else thought about waking up. 

~james

One interesting note about the MBVS.  The tree is putting out so many limbs from the stump, I'm having to prune them away (as are some of the other trees.)  However, those didn't show up until the other trees were also pushing out new growth.  For a month, the one sucker was the only growth.

The last two winters I have been paying close attention to when varieties go dormant and when they break dormancy.  A general rule of thumb that I have observed (and others have probably noticed as well) is that more cold hardy varieties tend to go into dormancy earlier and break dormancy later.  It won't be true for every individual tree all of the time, but in general it is accurate.  The reason this rule generally holds true is because all dormant fig wood and buds are fairly cold hardy down to around 15 degrees Fahrenheit or so.  The cold hardy varieties are the ones that get themselves into that protective dormant state early enough in the fall to avoid early freezes and that stay dormant long enough in the spring to avoid late freezes.  The non-dormant wood and buds is what gets killed by those 30 degree temps.  The most cold hardy varieties tend to get dormant early and stay dormant for longer.  The least cold hardy varieties are the ones that stay green and keep growing too late into the fall or that turn green and start growing too early in the spring.  At least that is what I've observed.

Joe, Thank you for your observation!

I notice that one of my fig doesnt even loose its leaves. All the leaves stay on all winter (I put my figs in my unheated, closed porch) and now it's outside with the rest and sprouting new leaves now, the old leaves still there. All my other figs lost its leaves.

Nepen,