As you all know this winter has been horrible. Supposed to get 3" of snow Sunday morning.
I wanted to share some pictures of my sleeping figs in the garage and the ones in the greenhouse.
What a big difference! The ones in the garage are all alive, but far from waking up.

The only difficult thing about the greenhouse. (Especially with a winter like we had this year.) Is heating it. I kept the thermostat at 42 degrees. I heat it with hot water via an outdoor wood boiler. Needless to say, I burnt a lot of firewood this year.

Art,

   I  like your greenhouse and your photos.

   Almost all of mine went into an attached garage. Just a few went to our unheated sunroom. I think some of those in the dark garage are showing more signs of life than those in the sun room. Hope that doesn't portend trouble.

Thanks Dale,

Good luck with your trees. It won't be long before we will be doing the fig shuffle.

Love the photos Art, makes me think a greenhouse is absolutely the way to go.

That is a heck of a difference Art

Those are beautiful figs and citrus. Nice work. I'd appreciate any info about which varieties breba taste best?

I have heated my greenhouse anywhere from 34 to 40F in winter. Either one has worked for citrus and figs. Then you could go up to 42F after the figs start breaking bud.

Steve, Good to know that you were able to let your temp get down to 34 and have no problems.
It will be a lot easier to keep that temp. The only concern would be when it goes from 34 to 85 on a sunny day. Would those drastic swings in temp cause any issues?

Looks fantastic Art . I agree that is a huge difference . Do you cut your own wood for the boiler? You'll have lots of breba . Greenhouse was definitely the way to go for citrus and maximizing breba! I'd like to hear about the breba's taste /variety also.

Wow very nice.. Which I had the room....a greenhouse is the way to go.

Art:

I don't think 34 to 85 will be an issue for figs or citrus. I'd probably draw the line at 90F this time of year, 100F in summer. On cloudy days it won't get over 50-60F. I've had citrus in both pots and ground. Nether was bothered by 34F at night. I do keep my winter days in the 50s for chilling other plants. Your warmer days should help by keeping up the average soil temperature for root activity.

I'm thinking about a separate greenhouse for figs and other low chilling fruits like grapes and citrus. Then I could run the warmer days all winter. That gets things going faster in spring as your setup shows.

Art, beautiful greenhouse, very nice plants , congratulations :)

Steve, Thanks for the info. I will probably have more questions for you down the road.

Pattee, Yeah I cut and split all the wood myself. Luckily I have about 45 acres of woods to cut from.
I will post pictures of the ripe breba in a few months.

Here are some pictures of my wood boiler. I will have this wood shed filled all the way full in a few months.
Even though I have a heat pump and an electric furnace. I heat the house and my water in the house with this boiler. I usually quit burning in May and start back up around October. It's a lot of work but it keeps me in shape.

[QUOTE=kubota1]As you all know this winter has been horrible. Supposed to get 3" of snow Sunday morning.
I wanted to share some pictures of my sleeping figs in the garage and the ones in the greenhouse.
What a big difference! The ones in the garage are all alive, but far from waking up.

The only difficult thing about the greenhouse. (Especially with a winter like we had this year.) Is heating it. I kept the thermostat at 42 degrees. I heat it with hot water via an outdoor wood boiler. Needless to say, I burnt a lot of firewood this year.[/QUOTE]

I like that

Hi Art
PHENOMENAL.... I could only wish....
Coop

You'll have more opportunity to test that wood burner. The weather is headed your way. Looks like we have an inch so far. NWS is predicting 5-8".


That's a lot of work, but it's satisfying, once you're inside and warm.

Hi Art
That is quite a setup you have! 
Curious how you also heat your house with the wood broiler?  Also do you move your figs out of the greenhouse for the summer?

Pino, Check this site out. http://www.centralboiler.com/home.html

Basically above the firebox there is 196 gallon water jacket on the model I have. There are two pumps. One pushes water to the greenhouse and the other to the house. There is a water-to-water heat exchanger on the side of my hot water tank to heat the water when in use. There is also a water-to-heat exchanger above my furnace. So basically the only electric I use is for the pumps and for the fan on my furnace.
In my greenhouse it's basically a fan that turns on when it needs heat.
I also heat my attached garage with the wood burner.

Before the greenhouse was built, I'd only have to load the wood burner once a day. Now with the greenhouse I have to load it twice a day. (That's on the coldest days.)
Now that it's getting warmer it doesn't use much wood. Load it once a day.

Pino,
Yes, once it gets warmer I will be bringing most of them out. Probably all of them.

Art,
That's a great setup!
Thanks.

Hi Art.
That's some beautiful looking plants you got there.
Good luck with them all.
Vito

Art here near Chicago our garage gets into the teens each winter to give you an idea .  ; )

Thanks Vito
Everything that you gave me at the Staten Island fig fest has a special place in the greenhouse.
They are looking real good!

Shailesh,
 Thanks for the kind words. It's a work in progress. I'm still learning about using a greenhouse.

All of the garage trees are outside. They are all leafed out and lots of breba.
The greenhouse figs are still inside. I hope to get them out Monday. It's supposed to get into the mid 30's Sunday night.
The bad thing is it's getting very hard to water the trees in the greenhouse. There's no room to move in there. I figured I'd have them out by now. Next year there won't be as many trees in there!

The pictures inside of the greenhouse are from both end doors and the figs by the house are the ones that were in the garage.

You are in 6a and you have that kinda growth. That's really great. I really enjoy green houses. My father raised orchids for 30 years in them. It's is so tropical, calm and peaceful.

Yeah Rich, I'm in far western Pa. very close to Ohio.
I did keep my thermostat in my garage at 40 degrees. I think that's what helped them out.

All your tree look great ! Greenhouse figs are phenomenal !! You should have quite a wonderful fig season Art. Can't wait to see all the fruit you get. All your hard work sure shows!

Pat, Thanks for the kind words.
It is paying off for me this year. But I'm going to have to get rid of a whole lot of trees before next winter. It's too much work!

Art, I feel your pain, I only have 25 trees and moving them in and out is a lot of work. I can not think,

how much time it takes to move all those tree. That is a lot of work. Your greenhouse is looking good.

You will be selling fresh figs on E-Bay LOL

Hi Art.
Wow that is beautiful. I know what you mean when you say you will cut back because it is a lot of work. I too will be cutting back but for a different reason, I plan on moving.

I've become a slave to these trees, I love them but they do tie me down. I have to make sure that if I go away, someone will water the figs, and that is usually my wife! Like I said, even so, it will be hard to cut back, every tree has a story behind it.
Vito

All I can add is PHENOMENAL!  That is a labor of love, undoubtedly.  You'll definitely be tasting your fruits of labor in a couple of months!

Nate

Art-

Wonderful to see the results of your efforts, and the big jump that you got on the 2014 season.

Just curious:

Were the grouping of garaged trees over-wintered at consistent temperatures around 40 degrees, but still always cooler than the greenhouse trees?  The greenhouse trees seem to be way ahead of the garaged trees.  Can this be attributed to the temperature differentials?

Even though your garaged trees have started to grow, I imagine that your night time temps in Zone 6a are still pretty cool.  Will your garaged trees still continue to grow, or will they stagnate until SOIL temps. are consistently warmer than 45-50 degrees?  Or, are your low night temps. no longer a factor.

There seems to be some conjecture as to why and when trees start to leaf out, and start to actively grow.  Leafing out in a garage, and then continuing to actively grow after being moved outside is the goal, but this may not actually happen until soil temperatures become consistently warmer.

Any observations that you can offer?

Art,

 a very impressive fig-collection and a very impressive heating system you got at home!
I can't imagine how much work and effort you put in there, wow.

The figs and the whole set up are really impressive!  When I want to dream I'll just think about these posts...  But, back to reality, what 3 figs in your group do you like the most?  I'm zone 4 and do the shuffle from basement to front porch to outside.  I will only plan on getting 2 more because of the work involved.  I already have Italian Honey fig.  Also, how long will your plastic on the greenhouse last, what mil?  Thanks for sharing the info and photos!

Vito, My problem is that I am a hoarder when it comes to figs. I won't get rid of a fig if it was given to me and I've had such good success the past few years with cuttings. It seems that as many as I give away, I get double in return.

Bugs, I plan on dumping some of my trees on you:) (Please!)

Christian and Nate, Thanks so much!

Frank,

 The temp. in my greenhouse at it's lowest was set at around 43 degrees. On sunny days it would easily get to 80 or higher. Late Feb. and early March is when they started to take off. I then bumped the t-stat up to 48 and they've been growing great since. Some of the plants have as much as 2 ft. of growth.
I will have lots of breba to try early this year.

As far as my garage trees go. I lucked out in early April. There was a week when the temps were up and the lows were in the 40's for about four days. All sun to boot during the days. They really took off.
For the last few weeks it's not been so great out. Tonight the lows are going to be around 35.
I plan on leaving them out because I'm burnt out.

Yeah, the big difference between the two is the temp. My greenhouse hasn't been below 50 at night and usually is above 75 during the days. Actually some sites say I'm in 5b, but I stick with 6a. Sounds better!

When I started growing figs I told myself that I would do what ever it take to eat figs. Not just 1 or 2, I want to be able to have containers full. (Daily in the summer)
Now that I've turned into a collector, it's a lot harder. I don't mind doing the shuffle in the spring, but I won't go thru this next year.

Greenbud,

The polycarbonate on the greenhouse has a 10 year warranty. On the sides it has a 16mm uv coated triple-wall and on the ends for strength it has a 10mm twin wall.

If you are interested in my greenhouse it's called a Riga XL.
Jason (7deuce) has a similar greenhouse. Look up some of his topics on his greenhouse. He has a nice setup.

[[Bugs, I plan on dumping some of my trees on you:) (Please!)]]

Art, Thanks but no Thanks. Unless they have some special taste or they will live outside uncover, just no

room. I dump about 10 trees last fall, that did not do well here, or no taste for me. That is the key I

Think.

Art-

Just read the answers to my questions, and my speculations are confirmed.  Soil temperature is the key to early growth in cooler climates.  Warm roots = early growth.

Thanks,

Frank

Spectacular.  As far as your figs can tell you're in zone 9 or so.

Art,

What a nice , well planned, organized and efficient set-up you have.  With a touch on the thermostat  (almost)  you ask your figs to ripen at will.
Nicely done and ready for some simple  additional testing (?) ..nothing to loose!

Good job.
Congratulations!

Francisco