Fig trees are vigorous growers and therefore require annual pruning to create a balanced tree crown, to train it into the desired shape and to keep it a manageable height for harvesting fruit.

✓ February/March – Prune to around 5cm any branches that are:

– damaged
– rubbing/crossing
– ‘suckers’ near the trunk of the tree (if you want to maintain a single-trunk tree)
– making your tree crown unbalanced
– making your tree an undesirable shape or too tall

✓ June – Cut each new shoot back to around 5 or 6 leaves.

✓ November – Remove any current season figs as these will not ripen now and will take energy away from the tree. Leave next year’s fruits, which will be roughly the size of a pea, and protect them from frost over the winter using frost fleece.

If you’d like to grow your own figs, ‘Brown Turkey’ is the best variety for the UK climate and is self fertilising. Fig trees like a sheltered spot in full sun and are best grown against a South West facing wall. Pot grown fig trees will be available at Homeleigh in the spring.