Figs for San Diego Climates

Plants That Produce

Figs

By Richard Frost

It is September and here in San Diego many varieties of figs will ripen from now through November. If tasting figs has you thinking about planting them, our climate will accommodate that even in September or October. As for choosing a variety to plant, you may wish to peruse the over 400 fruiting figs at http://figs4fun.com/Varieties.html compiled by our own San Diego resident Jon Verdick. Several of the figs listed there are available from local and online sellers, although Jon certainly has a larger collection available by appointment at Encanto Farms Nursery, http://www.encantofarms.com/.

Plant your tree in the ground away from the house and water pipes. Dig a hole about 32” by 32” by 18” deep to loosen compacted ground and amend if necessary so that the soil is a loamy mixture. Alternately, choose one of the “container” varieties below and plant in a 20 to 40 gallon pot. After planting, cover the soil with at least 3” of mulch. Water trees in the ground once per week, about 5 gallons for young trees and 15 gallons for larger established trees. Feed your tree monthly during the growing season with subtropical or citrus formula, such as 9-3-6 or 28-8-18.

The San Diego county environment does not have enough accumulated heat early in the year to fully ripen “spring” or “breba” crops on Fig trees. Therefore, all local trees should be pruned about waist high each year in early January. If the tree does not already have a crotch formation at this height one will certainly form. For containers, the crotch should be at the soil level. In the spring, long flexible whips will grow skyward bearing figs on the new growth as summer arrives. This single crop will mature by Fall.

Selected Fig Varieties For Regions of San Diego County

Name	San Diego Climate	Skin	Flesh	Fruit Size
Atreano	Inland, containers	green	pink	medium
Barnisotte aka Nero	Coastal, Inland	yellow-green	red	large
Beall	Inland	dark	purple	med-large
Black Mission	Coastal, Inland	dark	red	med-large
Celeste	Inland, cold hardy	brown-violet	red	small-med
Danny’s Delite	Inland, very cold hardy	purple	red	medium
Deanna	Coastal, Inland, cold hardy	gold	amber	med-large
Dottato	Long warm & hot summers	yellow	amber	medium
English Brown Turkey	Inland, very cold hardy	bronze	red	large
Excel	Inland, possibly Coastal	yellow	amber	medium
Hardy Chicago	Mountains	dark brown	pink to red	small-med
Janice-Kadota	Coastal	yellow-green	amber	large
LSU Gold aka Golden Celeste	Inland, possibly Coastal	yellow	red	large
LSU Purple	Inland, containers	purple	purple	med-large
Mary Lane	Coastal, Inland	yellow-green	amber	medium
Osborn’s Prolific	Coastal, Inland	bronze	amber-red	medium
Panachee	Coastal, Inland	striped	red	small-med
Rouge de Bordeaux	Inland, possibly Coastal	violet	red	medium
St. Jean	Inland, possibly Coastal	bronze-grey	pink	medium
Verte aka Green Ischia	Coastal	green	red	med-large
Violette de Bordeaux	Inland, Coastal, containers	purple	red	small
Vista	Inland, Coastal	dark	red	med-large
White Genoa	Coastal	very light	amber	medium

SDHS member Richard Frost is a certified edible gardening nut. For copies of past articles and more information, please see www.PlantsThatProduce.com.

Reprinted with permission from September 2009 "Let's Talk Plants," the newsletter of the San Diego Horticultural Society, www.sdhortsoc.org