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El Paso caprifig/wasp potential?

  • Dig

As the title suggests I am curious if there are any reports of the fig wasp in El Paso texas. I think I could have good success if I had a caprifig here. Please let me know your thoughts. There are large citrus, fig, pecan, etc around my house.

The caprifig trees would be fine, but still need a source for wasps.

Im buying a swarm of honey bees for my bee house.
Could bee's pollinate figs?
I have seen them before in ripe figs.

Doug

I wished bees could pollinate figs.  Sure would make it much easier.


  • Dig

As a beekeeper I wish that were the case.

I imagine some innoculated profichi would do the trick for the wasps, but would the wasps be able to overwinter here? I could keep the caprifig potted so that I could bring it into my basement during our brief winter


  The early wasp hatch just arrived in our locale here in Northern California...

   [yDW8UU] 

  • Dig

What are known cultivars of caprifigs that perform well? I will be doing a search also.

Quote:
Originally Posted by Dig
What are known cultivars of caprifigs that perform well?


  Caprifig - S,  UCR 271-1, and UCR 347-1 are all persistent caprifigs that do well here.

  • Dig

Thank you for saving me quite a bit of legwork.

Sidenote, has anyone worked on grafting caprifigs to themselves for full season pollination? Much like a 5 in 1 plum but for pollination.

Quote:
Originally Posted by Dig
...has anyone worked on grafting caprifigs to themselves for full season pollination? Much like a 5 in 1 plum but for pollination.


  It's by far done more here in California to abide by the letter of the law, vs. having an all-in-one tree.  (Regulations restrict each grower to a single caprifig tree, or 1.5% of their orchard, whichever is greater; in order to contain the spread of internal fruit-rot caused by fusarium, (wasp-borne)) 

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