North American Fruit Explorers mailing list at ibiblio

["Robert Bruns" <r.fred.bruns@gmail.com>]

Lucky -

 

I find that a 50:50 mixture of regular soil with soilless potting mix holds its water better.  The soilless mix wicks the water up to the surface rapidly, evaporating away the water, so I use 100% garden soil for the top inch or two.  I also use an oversized saucer to catch the runoff, and I water until the saucer is full.  Even then, 3 or 4 days between waterings is about the limit when the weather is hot.

 

Fred

 

On 8/4/08, Lucky Pittman <lucky.pittman@murraystate.edu> wrote:

I'm in zone 6; albeit 'hot' zone 6, in southern west-central KY -
about 70 miles NW of Nashville TN.
For a number of years, I had several figs in-ground in my
orchard.  For a couple of years, I tried covering them with piles of
leaves hauled home from residential areas in town.  They all froze
back to the ground, whether covered or not, so I just stopped
bothering.  Most would re-grow from the roots/crown, but rarely were
able to set and ripen fruits before freezing weather set in in Nov,
though I did get a good crop that ripened on LSU Purple one year.
Subsequently, I rooted cuttings from all I had in the ground, as well
as any other varieties I've accumulated since then, and keep them in
15-gallon pots, which I stick into the crawlspace underneath our
sunroom whenever temps start dropping into the 20s in late fall.
I still have a couple of survivors out there in the orchard - one of
which is LSU Purple; I've not looked recently, but guess I need to -
it may be ripening some figs now.
My biggest problem with potted figs is keeping them watered - they're
planted in a soilless potting mix, with extra pinebark fines mixed
in, so they're really well-drained, and if I don't water them daily,
they dry out rapidly.  If I leave town for even a couple of days, I
can't really count on my wife or kids to water them adequately, and I
come home to wilted fig plants that have aborted their fruit.
I'm thinking about doing 'pot-in-pot' with them, to alleviate this
problem, but it'll require digging some pretty good-sized holes to
sink another 15-gallon pot in the ground to set the one containing
the fig into, but it should alleviate some of the problem with their
roots drying out - but then I might have a very difficult time
getting them up in the fall, as I'm sure they'd send some roots out
into the surrounding soil - it's very common for me to have cut some
pretty substantial roots that have exited drain holes in order to
move my pots in every fall..\



Lucky Pittman
USDA Cold Zone 6
AHS Heat Zone 7
Hopkinsville, KY

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