Backyard Bee Hive Blog: Olympian Fig Tree, Air Layer vs. Cutting Prop

ON THE TOPIC of bees, figs can't be bee-pollinated! Their flowers are inverted and require a specialized pollinator. They're pollinated by wasps, aptly called fig wasps.

OFF-TOPIC: Here's an update on my fig tree propagations. As a reminder, in July 2023 I took one stem cutting and did an air-layer. The donor tree was dying from root knot nematodes (RKN), and the timing was ideal. But I didn't know if one method was better than the other. Have a look at how they compare —with updates into 2025.

Cut-branch propagation, 6-weeks from being taken off the donor plant (R) and being rooted in soil. Here it's getting its third pot-up. The donor plant is no worse for the wear of taking props.

Air-layered propagation: despite my negligence and letting the sphagnum dry out, look at that root formation! Click on the picture for a zoomable view.

Late-August 2023 (6 weeks after taking the cuttings): The cutting prop lost all but one leaf but then grew so fast it had to be potted up three times. It put all its energy into a single trunk. The well-rooted air-layer prop's first potting was into a 1-gallon nursery pot, where it sent up a whole new branch. The difference in leaf size is remarkable. The cutting (in the grow bag in the photo below) is pushing out huge leaves. I can only guess that the single trunk, which is thickening up nicely, is funneling lots of energy into leaf production.

Another 6 weeks: The air-layer prop doubled its number of leaves and is working to push out a third branch. I wasn't planning on potting up again but the squirrels dumped it over, looking for a place to plant acorns.

It rains so much here in Virginia, 20 inches in a 3-month period this summer, there's no such thing as a pot with too much drainage. Fabric grow bags work pretty well but you do have to watch out for mold and mushrooms growing on the bags. I haven't had ants move into my grow bags like they do my plastic pots. Every pot with a drainage hole has an ant problem, that is, until I scratch neem seed meal into the soil. It takes care of them like magic! Even though I have a solution, I'd rather not have the problem in the first place, so I'm switching to grow bags whenever possible.

The green fibrous stuff is Better Than Rocks, which I use in my outdoor pots with drainage holes. It is the only physical barrier I've found that keeps the ants from using the holes as doorways to their new favorite home.

I repotted the dumped over fig into a grow bag like its sibling. It's not quite apples-to-apples, though, because it has superior drainage with a bottom layer of Better Than Rocks. Container-grown figs will let you know if they aren't getting enough drainage, through brown spots on the leaves.

The Three Little Figs

October 2023: I finally found a use for nonrecyclable plastic onion bags! They're pretty effective at keeping the squirrels from planting acorns (until they break apart from exposure to the elements). The purple one is the cutting prop, red is the air-layered prop. See the difference in leaf size? The comparison is somewhat unfair, though. The air-layer was attached to a stressed donor plant (on the right). The donor has lots of fresh RKN galls so the neem seed meal and straight vermicompost did not remedy that problem. I'm having a hard time with the thought of throwing it away but it's too late in the year to take more propagations. What would you do?

April 2024 Update

Winter's are pretty mild in coastal VA. The trees stayed outside all winter, their pots simply snugged up against the brick wall of our condo. They even held their leaves throughout the dormancy period, Nov-March.

The cutting prop is single-stemmed and about 2-feet tall. The air-layer tree split into two branches so is half the height.

tree-form from cutting prop (L), multi-stem from air-layer prop (R)

June 2024 Update

Double bumps! They're a fig tree thing. One bud is a lateral (branch) bud; the other is a figlet or fig "embryo." Fig trees generally bear fruit on new, growing shoots (green wood) but may also fruit on one-year-old stems.

Double Bump: which is a branch bud and which is a figlet is TBD. Gotta guess?

July 2024

One year since taking the cuttings: nothing to report so here's a recipe! Roasted Figs with Mascarpone, from Mark Bittman's How to Bake Everything (highly recommend!)

July: the cutting-prop tree, right outside the kitchen door, is now 3-feet tall.

Late-August 2024 update

I'm seeing figs at the farmers markets, so I guess all my trees are giving me in 2024 is vegetative growth.

purple = cutting propagated, single-stemmed fig tree; red = air-layer propagated, multi-branched fig tree

One-year old trees are capable of fruiting but mine are waiting for year 2. As a matter of fact, I can see the formation of a breba! Brebas are a small Spring crop produced on last year's new growth. According to the Fig Boss, it comes 4-6 weeks ahead of the main Summer crop.

Double bumps on the vertical tree form (cutting prop). Pointy buds are branch buds.

The rounded bump is the breba. This one's on the multi-branched shrub form.

April 2025

Both trees overwintered 2024/25 in 3-gallon plastic pots. I re-homed the air-layered prop in a 17" rolling planter as its permanent home. That's as big as I can go with my tiny patio garden.

Unfortunately, despite taking precautions the cutting-propagated tree developed RKN so it went into the trash.

In nursery terms, I think this planter would be equivalent to a 10-gallon container.
So this is where my almost 2-year old—started from an air-layer—fig tree is at. Now we wait for fruit.