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Encanto Farms Nursery > Topics > Improved Celeste Observations
 
 


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noss

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Posted Reply with quote  #1 
What I've found:

I don't know if anyone is interested, but I've found that improved Celestes can and do have anywhere from one to five-lobed leaves and some of them have one to three-lobed leaves.  The ones with two lobes look like mittens.  Those trees are in my yard and are true iPs and I can see the leaves for myself on those.  IPs have larger eyes than regular celestes and will split and sour more easily, which is too bad for here.

I got iPs from different sources-four to be exact.  Most of the figs taste similar--delicious.  For three of the sources, the old pros made sure I understood that the fig trees I got from them were improved Celestes and not O'Rourkes.  The fourth source was Dalton's nursery and it didn't make any difference that tree turned out to be an improved Celeste because the figs from that tree are delicious, as are the three others and maybe she has figs that are a little more delicious than the rest.

O'Rourkes have mostly five-lobed leaves, but will have some one and three-lobed leaves.  Saw that at LSU and in friends' orchards.  I've yet to taste a really ripe O'R fig.  Had some set-backs with my trees the past two years, but am getting back on track.

I actually have had good luck rooting cuttings this spring.  Most of the cuttings I put into bags with just damp paper towels got those rings on the bottoms-forget what they're called, but they formed quickly and sprouted roots quickly.  Those cuttings that didn't-most are now and need to be cupped up and we'll see what happens and hope that the gnats don't get them all.

I did see several cuttings in the cups with roots that are trying to escape into the air.  A friend said that means they had good humidity in the container they were in, in their cups.  Please wish me luck in raising these babies, as it's about time I did something with cuttings besides kill all of them!  Thanks.)

Hope everyone is having, or will have a good fig season,

noss
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noss/a.k.a. Vivian Lafayette, LA Zone 9a Wish List: Col de Dame Blanc, Col de Dame Noir, Scott's Yellow, Tony's Brown Italian, any other fig that is good in the rain/humidity and has a real figgy flavor.
AL_Blake

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Posted Reply with quote  #2 
Awesome observations Noss. Good luck to you as well.
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Blake ZONE 8A AL

Wish list--Want to buy-- Native Black (Becnel farm), Figo Preto, LSU (Red, St. Gabriel Black, Scott's Yellow, Late Black, #156, #5), CDD B/G/N, Excel, Texas BA-1, RDB, Nero 600m, Sal's Corleone (Belleclare Nursery variety); Cajun Gold
rafaelissimmo

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Posted Reply with quote  #3 
I will have ripe improved Celeste in about a month and I will post pics. My first crop!
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noss

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Posted Reply with quote  #4 
Thanks Blake, for the compliment and the good wishes.  :)

rafaelissimo,  Can hardly wait to see your pics.  I hope you like the figs if you haven't tasted them before.  I like the brown figs the most, I think.  Mostly I like whichever fig I'm eating best, though.

noss
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noss/a.k.a. Vivian Lafayette, LA Zone 9a Wish List: Col de Dame Blanc, Col de Dame Noir, Scott's Yellow, Tony's Brown Italian, any other fig that is good in the rain/humidity and has a real figgy flavor.
CAJUNB

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Posted Reply with quote  #5 
Looking forword to tasting my first IC in about a month Ms. Viv................
sal

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Posted Reply with quote  #6 
What are the main qualities that makes it improved?
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Zone 6a Orange County NY
Wish list: Figo Preto,I-258,St Rita,
noss

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Posted Reply with quote  #7 
Hi Brian,

I don't think I realized you hadn't tasted an iC before.  I hope you like it.  I like the flavor a lot.  They do taste like regular Celestes, but augmented in flavor.  I like brown figs' flavor.

Why is it going to take a month before you get to taste it?

"Ms. Viv"
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noss/a.k.a. Vivian Lafayette, LA Zone 9a Wish List: Col de Dame Blanc, Col de Dame Noir, Scott's Yellow, Tony's Brown Italian, any other fig that is good in the rain/humidity and has a real figgy flavor.
noss

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Posted Reply with quote  #8 
Hi Sal,

Beats me, but the flavor is very good, IMO.

They split and sour in the rain more easily than regular Celestes.  Perhaps others will be able to answer your question better.

I think a drawback of having used a caprifig was that they got more open eyes, which was a drawback in a fig in our climate.

noss
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noss/a.k.a. Vivian Lafayette, LA Zone 9a Wish List: Col de Dame Blanc, Col de Dame Noir, Scott's Yellow, Tony's Brown Italian, any other fig that is good in the rain/humidity and has a real figgy flavor.
Herman2

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Posted Reply with quote  #9 
To Sal:Improved Celeste does not drop immature fruits like Regular Celeste does ,in most climates.
I tried many regular Celeste in my climate.
They all drop half of the crop,the early half of main crop,and so very few get ripe after that.
That is why it was improved,by Dr O "Rourke at La university!
AL_Blake

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Posted Reply with quote  #10 
I think to that the IC is a bigger fruit than regular Celeste. Yield should be better too as the IC doesn't drop as much fruit.
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Blake ZONE 8A AL

Wish list--Want to buy-- Native Black (Becnel farm), Figo Preto, LSU (Red, St. Gabriel Black, Scott's Yellow, Late Black, #156, #5), CDD B/G/N, Excel, Texas BA-1, RDB, Nero 600m, Sal's Corleone (Belleclare Nursery variety); Cajun Gold
AL_Blake

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Posted Reply with quote  #11 
Another good fact about IC is that it will still fruit if frozen to the ground. Pinch those tips and you will still get an abundance of fruit.
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Blake ZONE 8A AL

Wish list--Want to buy-- Native Black (Becnel farm), Figo Preto, LSU (Red, St. Gabriel Black, Scott's Yellow, Late Black, #156, #5), CDD B/G/N, Excel, Texas BA-1, RDB, Nero 600m, Sal's Corleone (Belleclare Nursery variety); Cajun Gold
sal

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Posted Reply with quote  #12 
I guess I should have researched the regular Celeste before I bought cuttings. Are the tastes similar?
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Zone 6a Orange County NY
Wish list: Figo Preto,I-258,St Rita,
noss

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Posted Reply with quote  #13 
Hello Herman,  It's good to see you posting.  I've been wondering how you have been doing.  I was telling some fellow fignuts that I have always trusted information that you share with others and that you're good to others, as well.  Very respectable combination.  :D

Another thing is, the iC is pretty much ever-bearing, which most Celestes are not.  My Celestes do tend to keep putting on fruit, but the quality goes down as the season goes along.

iCs do drop fruit if water-challenged and it doesn't matter what size they are.  Maybe not everywhere, but here, they do.  Bugs love the easy entrance into the more open eyes.  It's too bad about that, because iCs are delicious.

Celestes tend to put on huge crops of fruit and I don't think they could support ripening that many.  Good thing they have so many extra figs on them, if they're going to drop half the crop.  Too bad they put on so many more figs than they could support.  All the purpose that serves is to throw fignuts into a tizzy at seeing all that fruit dropping to the ground.

IMO, the Celeste is the wild child of figs and does her own thing.  She's a survivor and if the weather gets hot and dry, she jettisons her figs and survives.  She needs to be allowed to grow at will, which takes a lot of room, but she does better being able to live like that.  I've never seen a healthy Celeste that was puny.

Compared to Celestes, iCs are her refined children.
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noss/a.k.a. Vivian Lafayette, LA Zone 9a Wish List: Col de Dame Blanc, Col de Dame Noir, Scott's Yellow, Tony's Brown Italian, any other fig that is good in the rain/humidity and has a real figgy flavor.
noss

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Posted Reply with quote  #14 
Sal,

Root your Celeste cuttings and enjoy them.  With the spring rains we had last year, my Cs put on some excellent figs with unparalleled flavor.  They melted in my mouth and filled it with flavor that was so good.

Enjoy and don't fret.  Do you only have room for one variety of fig?

One thing I've noticed, down here, is this:  The Celestes that do the best are behind tall wooden fences, or walls of some kind, which shade the root area and protect the bottoms of the trees from low temps/wind.  Also the Celestes that are planted right next to a structure seem to do well.  The big Celeste tree that did so well, next door to us was planted in the back corner of the yard and was sheltered by fence line trees that protected it.  It didn't drop figs and I wish I'd have gotten cuttings, or air layers of it before it was cut down, but I didn't know how Celestes could be at that time.

Al,  My Celestes put out large figs, so they aren't that much smaller than iCs.  I've not seen tiny Celeste figs, but I hear about them.

A fig/fruit friend of mine has two beautiful Celeste trees in his yard and says they don't drop fruit.  He keeps his trees pruned well and they have dense leaf growth and delicious figs and those figs are prolific to the max.  I got a baby from one of his trees to try, as I've been on a quest to find Cs that have the qualities his trees show.  It may be that the trees are in just the right place for them.  One of them does better than the other, more vigor, but even the smaller one produces more fruit than they can eat/use and this year, they are letting me go pick from their trees to "help out."  I'm really glad I can help them with the fruit overages.  ;)

noss
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noss/a.k.a. Vivian Lafayette, LA Zone 9a Wish List: Col de Dame Blanc, Col de Dame Noir, Scott's Yellow, Tony's Brown Italian, any other fig that is good in the rain/humidity and has a real figgy flavor.
Herman2

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Posted Reply with quote  #15 
Hellow Vivian!

Well It seems that Dr O"Rourke did best as he could,to improve Celeste.
The climate conditions,in LA,can be too harsh,even for improved C,but here in NJ,Improved C,does not drop,and I have the belief,that,it does not drop in many states north of La.
It is also the earliest to ripe main crop here,it happen in a few years in a row,on Aug. 1.
That is before any other except Florea.
But ,personally I would choose Improved Celeste over Florea, when about taste,and flavor.
Of course other people will contradict me ,when about taste.
But any way these 2 are the earliest to ripe I know so they both are an asset when growing figs in colder shorter Summer climates
noss

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Posted Reply with quote  #16 
Hello Herman,

I know Dr. O'Rourke did a great job looking for figs that would be an asset to the commercial canning industry and they did produce some delicious varieties.  It's just that eye size thing that causes a problem.  It's a problem here and in other very wet areas, combined with the heat and often oppressive humidity.  You are correct when you say how these varieties do in other states that are not so extreme in climate.  Lucky, lucky people who live in those places.

I had a tree that produced some very large, yellow figs, one year and it was still living at the edge of the carport.  Well, it started raining and kept on raining and I had pulled it in under the carport to keep the water off of the tree, the figs and the soil in the pot and was waiting for the figs to ripen.  It was so humid that the figs actually exploded without any rain having gotten to them anywhere.  If I hadn't seen it, I would have been skeptical about their exploding like that.  I got rid of that little tree.  It was supposed to be a Gino's, anyway, so I bid on and won a Gino's from you on eBay that is a pretty little tree and produces some very good figs.

I'm eyeing a ripening iC right now and it's on the iC I got from Durio Nursery and is the next to oldest of my iCs.  That fig is getting quite big.  Their flavor is very good.

Taste is subjective because not everyone's taste is the same, neither physiologically, nor in what they simply like.  I find I like the brown figs the best because of their tendency to have that pronounced "figgy" flavor that's hard to describe, but I like figs in general and am not real picky when it comes to eating any one I can get my fingers on.  ;)

Isn't it great that there are figs that do well in so many different places?

Since you mention figs good for cooler, shorter summer climates, have you had the chance to do a trial on the LSU Scott's Yellow figs that Dan has?  He had said that the brebas are very good quality and are better than some figs' main crops in flavor and that would be good for cooler places, with shorter summers.

Thanks,

Vivian
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noss/a.k.a. Vivian Lafayette, LA Zone 9a Wish List: Col de Dame Blanc, Col de Dame Noir, Scott's Yellow, Tony's Brown Italian, any other fig that is good in the rain/humidity and has a real figgy flavor.
Herman2

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Posted Reply with quote  #17 
No ,I do not have LSU Scott yellow,but it would not be good for my climate,because breba figs die here over the Winter if tree in ground.
I only grow figs in ground lately due to ,being too much work for me in pot growing.
Best Regards
AltadenaMara

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Posted Reply with quote  #18 
This winter I bought an Improved Celeste from Almost Eden and then found on the fig forums that people were posting that it was really Celeste. So I bought an O’Rourke from Petals from the Past when it was posted that PftP’s O’Rourke was really an Improved Celeste. Both trees so far have the 1-3 lobed leaves that are supposed to be characteristic of Improved Celeste and not the five lobed leaves characteristic of Celeste and O’Rourke. Whatever they turn out to be when they are big enough to make figs, I’m sure I’ll enjoy eating them. 
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Mara  Southern California  Zone 1990= 9b   2012= 10a  2020=?

 
noss

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Posted Reply with quote  #19 
Hi Mara,

It's not real easy to find a true O'R, is it.

I am seeing, with my own eyes that regular Celestes have anywhere from one to five-lobed leaves.  ICs can have five-lobed leaves, but usually have between one and three lobed-leaves and some will have five-lobed leaves, here and there.  O'Rs can have one to three-lobed leaves, but mostly have five-lobed leaves.  I saw that on the trees at LSU Burden Center, myself, as well as on my own Celestes and iCs.  Wait and see what the fruit looks like with the leaves.  You will be able to compare the one said to be a regular Celeste, to the one said to be an iC, at least.  Three of my iCs have mostly one-lobed leaves.

I have a Belleclaire Celeste that is ripening a fig that has a bell shape to it.  Never seen that before.  Will be interesting to see what shapes the rest of the figs have and how they taste.  Whatever they are, I hope they are good.  Right now, the eye is real tight and small.

This should just be a Celeste in general thread, maybe.

I like the heart-shaped and mitten leaves, as shapes.  My Celeste out front, Legacy, had some huge five-lobed leaves on her the past few years and last year, she put on delicious figs.

noss
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noss/a.k.a. Vivian Lafayette, LA Zone 9a Wish List: Col de Dame Blanc, Col de Dame Noir, Scott's Yellow, Tony's Brown Italian, any other fig that is good in the rain/humidity and has a real figgy flavor.
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