Quote: Originally Posted by FrozenJoe
Thanks for the comments everyone!
Christian the hot dry climate here does affect the fig trees. Temps here are above 100F almost everyday from June to September. The sun is always shining and it feels very hot. Some of the trees grow with large soft leaves. But many of them do seem to produce smaller more leathery leaves in this climate. I also notice that the trees grow dense, with not that much distance between the leaves. I think these changes are the fig tree's natural response to the climate. Smaller harder leaves lose less water to transpiration. A denser growth habit casts more shade on the root zone.
Over 100F, 3 month long?!? How do you survive there? ;-)
That phenomenon you mentionend, i could also watch at the south coast of Turkey which i visited in april and november 2013: thick, kind of leathery leaves...but the groth was huge - this years branches, over an inches thick!
I noticed in my climate, when a tree is in a spot where the full sun is only a few hours a day, the leaves can be very thin and huge...in full sun the whole day, much thicker and and not as big. Of course not as extreme like in your case.
Anyway...i like the look a fig gets in your desert climate!
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