I have some foul news.  The "unknown Voiture" parent plant is dead.

It appears some kids torched the Voiture hall building last night.  10 trucks were required to put out the blaze.  All that's left of the building is a shell of two walls, with one wall fully caved in, and another wall half caved in.

All of the plants along the south side of the building are toasted.  This includes the unk Voiture fig tree.  So, whoever has cuttings of this tree, the parent tree is gone ... you're the only ones with a definitive copy of this tree.

This was the scene around 7am this morning, with AFD still trying to put the fire out.

Oh -and JD, the unk Hobart tree is less than a block from the Voiture property, so I snapped off some photos of it.

There is a picture of the fruit from unk Hobart in post #13 of this thread. 

Here is the tree.  For reference, the chain link fence pictured is 6' tall.  The tree is about 14' tall and 18' wide.  A cinder block is 8" tall and wide, so the base of the tree is about 14" wide.  Most trunks are about 4"-5" wide.  The largest trunk is around 7" wide. 

Wow. 'Sketchy' is putting it nicely. Wonder what evidence was burned up with that fire. Thanks for posting the photos.

More importantly, well wishes over the next couple of weeks. You get one to experience one of those moments that reveals the beauty, delicacy, power, joy, pain, and serenity of life. I wish your wife, your unborn child, and you all the best.

JD

Thanks JD.

A neighbor reported seeing two kids walking out of the property around 2am, about 4 hours past their curfew, but didn't bother to call the cops.  I guess he didn't find it suspicious to see 2 teenage kids out at 2am, past curfew, walking out of an abandoned property with a shell of a building on it that's constantly being vandalized.  Some people just don't get it.

And some pics of the blaze taken from the northwest corner (other photos are from southwest corner)....

It may well come back from the roots. It rooted like crazy, and I have 2-3 extras., so it is not gone completely.

@Jon, we shall see.  They brought out bulldozers and levelled the building after running cadaver dogs through it.  I think a lawsuit is about to be filed, since the neighbors have been contacting the property owner for over 3 years about the lack of safety and security of the property, which ultimately led to this.  I don't know what damage the bulldozers would do.  I guess one good thing is that the roots were under the asphalt, so maybe it will survive.  Or maybe the heat transfer of asphalt melting will kill them?  I'll check back in spring, I guess.

@noss, evidence of arson.  They ran cadaver dogs through and I don't believe they found anything.  Everything points to arson, and I think it's being investigated as such.  The neighbors care enough to pursue and we have a good line through to the authorities, with lots of City Hall members living nearby that have tried to work with the property owners, and the city just forked out a hunk of money on this little incident, so ... hopefully the level of care is there.  I agree with you on destroying vs. good works.  Kids these days ...

Man, I gotta say, I always love coming back and looking at pics of the Unkown Voiture trees, JD.  Thanks for posting those.  Even if it produces terrible fruit, it has one of the most beautiful leaves I've ever seen.

You are welcome Jason.

They are still doing well (not much yellowing and leaf drop). As I mentioned previously, I think I mislabeled the 4th one because the leaves look exactly the same.

Night temps have been in the mid to upper 30s so I am getting quite a bit of yellowing on the plants in pots. Although with a potted RdB, the two in ground (Stallion & Hardy Chicago) have not shown any signs of yellowing. Note: all of Stallion & Hardy Chicago in pots are totally yellow.

Once all of the leaves fall and I am certain of dormancy, I will protect them with plastic on a pvc frame. I thought about the greenhouse option but here we get maybe 3-4 frosts and about 10-12 days worth of extremely cold (sub 25 degree) nights. So it makes protection less of an exercise.

JD

I am still on the fence about what to do with my trees over the winter.  My garage is usually around 50ºF (it's a basement garage), so it's not very well suited to overwintering.  Temps do get down low in the winter here, and we do get snow, etc., and we get plenty of sun during the winter .... it's a tough call.  We also have chipmunks and squirrels that would really love to get into a greenhouse and make homes....

Tough call ....

I can tell you this - we had a overnight freeze a couple weeks back - it scorched all of the new growth on my in-ground trees.  The leaves shrivelled and dessicated, then fell off.  The other leaves are barely starting to yellow.  It's crazy.  Most trees in our area have lost half or more of their leaves, and the rest are yellow. 

So, Martin helped me to find this picture tonight via a hungarian website, and this fig looks so much like the "Unknown Hobart" fig it's not funny - the the point I'm almost convinced it's a positive ID.  Compare these two pictures of "Napolitana blanca" to the picture of a mostly-ripe "Unknown Hobart":

Quote:

Originally Posted by satellitehead
Ok, finally, I have pictures of some fruit from "Unknown Hobart", which could be Marseilles or any number of other bright-green figs with a large open eye and strawberry-ish pink pulp.

BTW - This is the Spanish site with lots of crazy fruits and stuff I found via pictures at the Hungarian site:  http://www.jardin-mundani.com/English/index.htm

Lots of cool stuff.  Even Pitanga ;)

Nice link Jason/Martin! Pretty cool stuff. The Arbutus unedo aka Strawberry Tree was a surprise to see. I tasted some fruits last year and they are pretty yummy.

I had link stored on computer i may have gotten it from one of the forums i dont recall. Im loseing my memory or something by reading so many things on internet including forums.
The name Jardin-Mundani rings a bell in my head , i read that name before but cant place it.

So, I handed out Voiture #217 cuttings to several folks - being that this fig tree is officially gone, and doesn't resemble much else out there, I'm curious if anyone that rooted cuttings in 2009/2010 is seeing brebas on their trees this year?  I haven't yet - had some setback on my trees last year due to travel.

Always interested in seeing pics if anyone has them!  :)

I love the look of the Voiture #217.  Have you gone to the site to see if anything is coming up? 

Mine are still small, but they did root easily, and I have several.

@Sara, I was able to sneak on the property two weeks ago. The spot where the tree was is now a 18" thick pile of concrete rubble. Everything within a 100' perimeter of the building is dead except grasses. It would seem the only thing left of the Voiture tree now is what was passed out in cuttings via this thread. Taking cuttings and passing them out for free is looking like it will pay off in the long run... Timing couldn't have been better, I guess!

Good timing Jason.   Am hoping, eventually, to get my hands on that plant.  Also, after looking at the Morley, it is now on my list!!  Putting some feelers out to see what I can find.  

Knowing my luck, given my area, watch ... Unk Voiture will end up being another Celeste ;)  Granted, I think Unk Morley has more of a chance of being Celeste than the others, but ...

Jason,

My money is on Unk. Voiture being a Brunswick.

Hey Ruben,

That idea was pitched offline (via email thread), and the consensus from the heavy-hitters was, "it's not likely". 

For one, the fingers are quite different.  They're not nearly as long as Brunswick and much more serrated down the length of the fingers, even when mature.  Note that Brunswick is smooth down the length of the incredibly long fingers and "keyed" at the end.  Look at JD's pictures above (post #19)  and compare to what you just posted to see the stubby fingers and serrations or frills down the length.  The differences from Brunswick (I think) are pretty clear.

To boot, Voiture has a couple of different leaf patterns (See post #6 for an example).  Brunswick is pretty much the same 7-finger leaf every time, from what I've seen (I'm comparing it to the Unknown Haikel Lebanese I have, which is a more likely candidate for Brunswick).

If you're right, I might owe you a cold one.  I'm not against the possibility, I'm just skeptical based on the growth I've seen so far.

Jason,

That is why I posted the picture of the tree when it was younger. You will note that the lobes are more auricled. Here is another pic of the leaves of the older tree. These are more auricled too. Very similar to JD's 4th pic on post #19. Another thing about Brunswick is that it rarely produces a breba crop. That will be the next sign. lol.

EDIT: forgot to mention that the lack of auricles on some of the leaves could be due to the fact that the tree only gets sun from morning to mid-day.

Two add'l considerations:  One, the cuttings produced several breba figs (see first post), Two see the predominant leaves in post #6 which are the mature leaves of the plant - they may look similar in juvenalia, but mature leaves seem quite different.

Jason

Would you have spare cuttings of these?

George