Gang,
I have 20 fig trees in ground or pots and a few more cuttings that I am trying to root. I have only one fig that has developed (size of a quarter). I am getting a ton of vegetative growth and have been pinching my trees getting some nice branching but I don't see any fig node swelling, at all. Is there a way to get the fig growth jump started??? I fertilize my plants with slow release granules and a watering fertilizer. I have some in bush form and some in tree form. None of my trees are more than 2.5 years old so maybe I am being impatient but my plants have tons of fig nodes at leaf stems and are healthy. I am just wondering if there is something I can do or stop doing that will get my plants into fig production mode. Thanks

The granual is 3-5-5. The mix is a diluted 22-24-12.

Hi Kevin -

From my experience - I noticed more sunlight means more fruits.  I have cuttings 3 years ago that I planted 1 in South facing which gets sun from dawn 'til dusk and another one in East side which gets sun all day but not after 4 PM.  The south side ones started fruiting in 2nd year and east facing has fruits coming this year.  In terms of Fertilizer - less is better for Figs.  I would suggest using something organic granular that will benefit the soil and slowly release the nutrients to the soil.  I have good luck using the Jobe's spikes in the spring.  If figs tend to grow faster - it produce less. 

Good luck.

The granular is Jobes organic citrus and fruit. The powder is a bright blue mix from Stark Bros called Tree Pep or something like that.

I'd suggest letting the potted figs become root bound. That slows them down and promotes fruiting. Here's a root bound fig in a 12 gallon pot that's being pushed with water and fertilizer and it still fruits like crazy. I'd say this is 4th yr since being potted with no root pruning.

Fignutty,
I can honestly admit I have never even considered that approach. It seems to make perfect sense. I have been trying to avoid that by keeping my pots oversized to accommodate root growth. Maybe I will let a few get bound and observe the results. Thanks

It also helps to have varieties that are early setters. Things like Preto, Black Madeira, Strawberry Verte, St Rita and many others. Preto/BM may take a long season to ripen but they can and often do set figs on the very first node of the season and everyone thereafter.

RdB and most of the CdD varieties on the other hand are very reluctant to set for me pinched or not.

I have Chicago Hardy, Brown Turkey, Black Madeira, Marsallies, Black Mission, VdB, Col de Dame Noir, Sucrette, Green Ischia, and an unknown.

I have never really researched to find out what fruits early and late and what has one crop vs. two crops. I assume I would just learn as I went but maybe I should figure out a little more about variety characteristics.

Full sun as much as you can and pinching after 5 leaves helps a lot.
I agree about the root bound approach but the watering can become tricky since the figs are very sensitive to the *consistency* of watering. Dry - wet - dry will not produce a tasty fig

Kevin:

Is Black Madeira not setting for you? I've got new cuttings with figs at the first node. Not every plant but some.

I had some Gino's Black last yr that had ripe figs 5 months after starting the cuttings.

Kevin, I am just short distance north of you in MD (same zone) and am noticing the same thing.  In fact I still have two in-ground figs that haven't fully leafed out!  I think a major issue is that we just haven't had very much heat (and sun) this Spring.  We have went into a couple warm spells but then come back to cool weather like we are in now.  I am thinking of pinching some of my figs in a week or so.

Rewton,
I am ready for the heat. I am tired of the highs being in the 60s.

Yeah sounds like the environment is playing a role. last year here we had a fairly cold summer, but it was sunny and dry, I got hundreds of figs off of 2nd leaf plants. This year has been cloudy and rainy, but I have a lot of breba figs growing. We will see how the main crop does?

My RdB grown in ground also has not been particularly productive so far.  But my hope is that with maturity it will become so.

Fig varieties are very important for Breba or main crop.

I got couple 5 ft tall fig trees in 2G pot from nursery last spring, I planted them in ground at sunny spot, one month had passed, no breba figs, I went to same nursery, All potted fig trees in tiny pots with slow release fertilizer was full of figs.
Steve(Fignutty) is right, If you rootbound fig trees with high dose fertilizer, it will give u lots of breba.

One year had passed, in ground fig trees did not top grow very much even with some compost/manure, about 1 Ft more canopy without breba/main, I wonder why?, I planted my fig trees in 6Ft x 6Ft raised garden, I opened one side panel of raised garden,  it was filled with full of roots, it put highest portion of growing in its roots.

Spring has passed, no breba fig again, many fig trees was top killed by cold winter's wind, In ground tree with lots of roots or root bound in raised ground,   They put all their energy to grow branches instead of breba, it put on 2Ft new branches in one month while non top killed in ground tree, they put on 5 inches new branches with breba.
 

Yes, I agree that when young figs in pots with roots restricted will be more productive than those grown in ground if you are comparing trees of similar size.  However, I also have an impression (though have not done a controlled study) that figs from root bound trees don't have as good a flavor than those coming from happy/healthy trees.  A forum member from Nevada had a post about this a couple of years ago I think.  Eventually I think that in-ground trees will mature and put more of their energy into producing fruit.  What I'm not sure is how long this will take under my growing conditions.

Here I don't really have an option of in ground trees. They will die back every year. I can protect them, but even with protection it's cold here, they may die back anyway. No matter how big a pot the fig will fill it with roots. So I guess I'll never know what established tree figs taste like? I do know once mature, like 4-5 years they should be better according to most university writings I have seen. The figs are not bad, so I'm happy.

When it comes to fruiting, there are no easy answers. I've tried just about every trick in the book and finally concluded that age of tree might be the most important ingredient.
Let's take my Panache as an example. I kept it root bound, pruned it, root pruned it and pinched it to no avail. This year I decided not to do anything to it except moving it to a 25 gallon container while it was dormant. Well after five year, I finally see fruit and I'm sure that the container size did not immediately help in this matter.
With Col de Dame Gris in ground the crop increases with age. Same with my potted Celeste.
In many cases I found that heavy pruning reduced productivity as the tree tries to recover and now my pruning has been reduced to a minimum unless I need to reshape or cut out dead wood.

Cold can kill the breba buds even without killing the branch.

Finally, overnight I had a dozen figlets form on one of my Chicago Hardy trees.

Here are some pics from a few days ago.  A few days in the 80s plus some pinching has gotten me a few figs.