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unknown cultivar from Marseille

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... short and narrow pedicel, ripen in late august, no breba crop

flavour not very sweet, a bit 'lemoned'.

Leaves deep green, 5 lobed, with uper lobes small, the tree grows slowly, very drought resistant, more than other cultivars (as Sollies...)

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Thanks a lot for your help!

Chriss

Strongly suspect Bellone.

Thank you for thet determination. Bellone looks like, with yellow petioles. But it seems that Bellone has thiner skin?

Wouldn't know.  You said it was a fruit with some tartness.  It's not super small, either...Soooo...there aren't really very many candidates with thicker skin/piths that aren't sugared like Mission/Noire de Caromb/etc...Could very well be some random seedling some French dude liked.  Or an imported variety from Spain or Italy.

Also, Southern France just has a tremendous variety of very similar figs.  If you take the Petite Negri, for example, if you squint at it, you could think the tree and habit is similar to Sultane or Violette Soleis, and the brebas on my trees strongly resembles Violette Soleis.  Yet, it's hard to tell it from Violette de Bordeaux much of the time.  So you can see that it's really important to keep labeling straight!

I have a fig identical to yours ,named Marseilles black vs,and come from Mryland Family,her father brought cuttings from Europe after war.

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That fig is closer to the Etna class, I think, and the leaves of the unknown here really does look like something closely related to the Bordeaux/VS.

Herman: Leaves are the same, but on your pic pedicel seem longer, mine are very short.

"Unknown" is a tree I bought many years ago an olg guy. In my garden, the tree is drought resistant, and vapour pressure deficit resistant. To make an idea, Violette Sollies died in my orchard (even irrigated), because very stressed by low hygrometry level. This one grows, but very slowly. I am located closed to the parc National des Calanques, a dry convective place, where climate has semi-desertic affinity. Strong selective pressure applies on non adapted-cultivars.

So your Black Marseilles lives in Maryland since WWII? Cool! I went in Bethesda in 90's... I was stupefied that Maryland climate had affinities with Marseille. What flavour has your Marseilles fig? A bit lemoned and not very sweet??

Shah: Etna class.... ?? Is it in Hillgardia classification?

shah: I confirm it is important to keep straight label!! ...

I only wish Maryland climate was more like Marseilles!  But I guess it's close enough that some varieties from southern France (such as MvsB) do very well here.

MvsB is always lumped in with the Mt. Etna figs but I'm not sure how much this has to do with the leaf shape, the fruit or cold hardiness.  Or genomic DNA mapping? Maybe Herman can shed some light.  It would be interesting to know how big the figs from your unknown are (as MvsB are a bit on the small side) - do you have an image with size marker?

Here it is very sweet , berry flavor  when getting ripe under dry conditions, and only satisfactory sweet when getting ripe under rain conditions.
Climate here is much more difficult for fig than Southern France, in that it rains a lot excessive rains in July and August.
This fig after my observation, is capable of growing everywhere on the planet ,if planted in full sun, from Louisiana south till southern Alaska, because it is hardy resistant to rain and drought, and can be successfully grown by anyone with minimum effort and care.
Of course the pedicels are longer because of the climate here, start of August ,this year it rained ,7 inches(17cm) in one night, and this is not the only time it happened.
In rainy climates ,adaptable figs develop long pedicel to bent down ,to have the eye at bottom, to deflect water from getting in.
Yes Marseilles vs black is lumped into Mt Etna figs,because it is similar in many aspects,but it is not necessary, a fig that was solely found wild growing on Mount Etna only.
It is absolutely possible that this fig was growing in all Mediteranian climates as ,a wild fig,and that is more true when we look at the evidence ,that exist,in one of example.
The dark Portughese,is without objection a Mount Etna type,but Portugal is way far from Mediteranean sea,yet it is known to be of ancient origine there.
The main representative of Mt Etna type fig,is Hardy Chicago,but it has different leaves compared to Marseilles vs black.
Hardy Chicago,has more jagged leaves, no doubt.

Here the climate is USDA 9b (last winter -13°C but exceptional, -6°C is frequent).

Native vegetation is composed by Pistacia lentiscus, Juniperus phoenicia, Rhamnus alaternus, Smilax aspera. These plants are very convective-resistant.

The soils are dry in summer, and thin. The bare rock (= high density limestone) is everywhere. This kind of rock have low thermal effusivity, thus energy ground flux is weak, and convective flux is high. The Bowen ratio (= Convective flux divided by Latent heat flux) approaches "infinity", thus evaporative tension high and air is hot.

In these conditions, the plant (incuded fig trees) have to be adapted: stomatas need to remain closed when evaporative tension is high (occuring at noontime).

Not surprising, cultivars adapted to high hygrometric ambiance died here (Violette Sollies...), only those whom were adapted are alive and grows well.

It is very interesting to get Herman advice, especially about DNA mapping. Finally, all the ways are leading to taxonomy: morphotypes, cytotypes, DNA-types. "Physiotypes" are nice to be tested, too, by moving selected genotype in several environments with contrasted Bowen ratio.

Tomorrow, I will shoot other pics, with some euros coins beside them. (Sorry, no box around:)

You should try Violette Soleis again.  Did it die before getting established?

Etna style figs do tend to be pretty drought resistant, come to think of it.

Shah8: I was around my baby-Sollies, like a mother near his child. Afetr the fiasco, one idea came that I made confusion with irrigation and ambiance. You may bring tons of water, if the evaporative loss (controled by stomatas and genes...) is not accorded with ambiance and microclimate, and especially evaporative tension, the undadapted cultivar will die, volens nolens...

It is important to keep in mind that Violette Sollies is cultived in Vallée du Gapeau, with plenty of water in the soil, and a vadose-zone very thin..; maybe the soil is satured below 2 or 3 meters (even in summer!), so that energy solar partition is special: the soil remains cold during day because energy is wasted, and vaporise water located in the pores of the soil (rather warming surface and air adjacent, in the boundary layer). So we can affirm Sollies is NOT a convective-resistant tree.

Let me think about Etna types.... Are they South-faced or North faced? The sicilian climate is very contrasted. North is densely wooded (Zelkova...). South is drier... Etna is lava made. Perhaps the lava have low effusivity, so the climate, on south face, is very convective?

Hermann: As a newbie in fig, I try to understand the coherence of the concept "Etna type".  Then, you lump Chicago, Portughese and Bmarseilles.

Ok for the pedicel lenght. The deflection is a very clever evolutive process. It is a nice case of environmental morphological variation. It should deserves ANOVA biometry computing, to discriminate the genotype effect!:)

... By the way, thank you indeed to  specialists, Hermann, Rewton, Shah8. Your advices are VERY appreciated!

Yes ,they are similar,i wouldn't say identical,but if you study them you will notice they must be related.
Etna type was coined here in the USA because most specimen of this type came here with Sicilian emigrants,and,someone from Italy,reaserched the type and said that this type of fig grew wild at low altitude on Mount Etna ,and it was collected and cultivated first by  Sicilian sheperds ,that found it wild up there while grazing the animals.
Of course it can very well be that the plant was growing wild in many other places in Southern Europe,at the same time.

Hermann, I red the thread you done on this:

http://figs4funforum.websitetoolbox.com/post/List-of-Mt.-Etna-type-figs-5755177

... Where you explained the method to avoid wasting time and money. I have the same philosophy than yours. Do you think that if I use the "Etna group fig trees" in my garden (Chicago, Black Portughese...), they will be also adapted to my soil and climates?

It would be interesting to test the behaviour of each "physiotype" (= behaviour of each genotype VS several environment contrasted respective to the Bowen ratio).

For now, I just know that BMarseilles is adapted to hot/dry environment. I guess it would be the same for Etna fig tree. Concerning Portughese fig tree, it it possible that morphologic and biometric features are the same, without similarity on physiologic behaviour: Portugal has high hygrometric level, oceanic climate, with Bowen ratio weak. (Except in  Estramadura).

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56 g more or less... Fig that I pick up was median in weight

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Black Marseille VS beside LR6 battery...

Quote:
Originally Posted by Herman2

Yes ,they are similar,i wouldn't say identical,but if you study them you will notice they must be related.
Etna type was coined here in the USA because most specimen of this type came here with Sicilian emigrants,and,someone from Italy,reaserched the type and said that this type of fig grew wild at low altitude on Mount Etna ,and it was collected and cultivated first by  Sicilian sheperds ,that found it wild up there while grazing the animals.
Of course it can very well be that the plant was growing wild in many other places in Southern Europe,at the same time.



Hello hermann, I have a question for you: what means the letters 'VS' you add to the name Black Marseilles??

The letter vs,are my initials,and were added by Jon Verdick,at,Figsforfun farm,in California,to show where he got the cuttings under what name.
The Marseilles name was ,what the old lady,that owned the fig in Maryland said her father,told her the fig was.
So Jon named it Marseilles vs first and then when it made dark color figs,the black word was added to differentiate  from Marseilles white ,which is very common here in the US.
By the way:You might find it look a little different as grown in New Jersey,because ,too much water in soil,make the tree grow long distances between nods,and extralarge leaves, sometimes complete leaf shape like five lobes and two tumbs ,and that is not occuring  in southern France,in dry climate.
Yes all the other specimen of Mount Etna figs are adapted to most climates,if they are not infected with Fig mosaic virus.
I had a Missnamed fig under Sicilian black,name,heavy infected and never grew tho it was a Mt Etna type.

Ok. Mine is a small tree, because growing on thin soil and convective/hot/dry air, with scarce irrigation. But I know one specimen growing in irrigated soil which shows fastigiate shape, with wide trunk, and rather short branches emerging along the sides. Maybe 10 m tall...

It is strange that my fig have a tartness flavour. I use to say they are fig you can eat when you are not hungry...

Why would you think the tart flavor is so unusual?  Most Bordeaux figs have some degree of tartness.

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