I am in Michigan and I uncovered my trees on March 5th. We have had two nights with temperatures at 15F since then. The reason I uncovered them is because for the past two winters my trees died due to mold. When I uncovered them this year there was only a little bit of mold on one tree and I do not think it was enough to kill the tree. All of my trees have come back from their roots each year and they grow about eight feet tall and one inch in diameter at the base each year. I am not an expert; in-fact I am just beginning to learn, but I am willing to take a chance with the cold because in the past my enemy was mold.

Jack,
I'm in Southern CT too. I'm no expert on winterizing figs because I grow mine in containers, However, my neighbor used plastic to wrap his tree and killed it. The plastic caused too much moisture to accumulate as the sunny days started to warm up followed my the cool nights. Maybe another poster can advise you. Good luck whatever you decide.

Peg

I dug a hole to put my big potted fig in the ground, I uncovered mine for the day and covered it back up since it's still too cold at nights still. The tree looks like it made it, has lots of buds. I think if you cover it up with something so the frost don't get at them they should be fine.
I also had an ant problem one year, I ended up putting my fig in a small kids pool with the fig tree raised in the pool, I fill the pool with some water and solved that problem :)

Ryecooder,
i use a product in a tibe thats called tanglfoot on my fig trees i smear around near base of trrunk its like a honey and crawling bugs dont get past it what so ever and does not hurt tree , it looks like grease coming out of the tube. It does not cost a arm and a leg either and bought at garden center. It might be easier for you as one year them darn things were in my mouth as i often just eat right off the tree, course there good protien from what i here but there just not as tasty i think as a fig. I dont have problem with ants anymore and think i have them darn blangit wasp under control as well with tree traps but thats another long story of mine meeting up with them.
Martin
Martin

Uncover when temps look to stay above 20-25F for the rest of the spring. Check the 10-day forecast to increase your odds on that. My figs are overdue for uncovering now.

Scott

Follow Up Post:

I bit a reluctance type bullet on my part and called the state Cooperative Extension System Home & Garden Education Center. And today was my lucky day. I just happened to call when a qualified person was in the office (there have been all kinds of personnel cutbacks). She was very knowledgeable about figs.

Her recommendations were virtually the same as scottfsmith, with one exception, i. e., addition. She said that if the temp were to drop below the 25-20 threshold (which would most likely occur at night), it would be advisable to RE-insulate before nightfall (using blankets, sheets). In my case, we concocted a plan that when I removed the leaf mulch (which I have not looked at yet), unless it looked terribly diseased not to discard it to the compost pile, but to store it in my wheelbarrow and cover it from getting wet, and I could simply, if/when needed, roll it over to the fig trees, put the garbage cans back around them, and refill them (prior to nightfall for as long as the cold snap lasted). Sounded reasonable to me, and that is my plan (with only two trees gathering up the mulch early in the AM, and putting it back at nightfall on a few occasions would not be particularly onerous).

Re the tanglefoot post: also discussed; NOT to use it until the ants started attacking the figs, and not applying it directly to the bark (probably I will cut (or fold) some plastic wrap into bands and attached with some way of jury rigging rubber bands on top & bottom of each band).

jacinct, Using plastic wrap might cause a problem. I've used brown paper bags cut into three or four inch strips and attached them to the tree with masking tape. (Just remember that masking tape isn't all created equal - get a good quality tape - Scotch or such.) Make sure the little critters can't get under it. Once the paper and tape is on the tree, smear it with the tanglefoot. The masking tape won't hurt the bark and will come off very easily when you want to remove it.
Good luck.

Jack, part of your post,

Re the tanglefoot post: also discussed; NOT to use it until the ants started attacking the figs.

Tanglefoot contains 3 ingredients

Castor oil
Natural Gum Resin
Vegtable Wax

So its harmless .

I dont wait to see ants, they by me come in great numbers it seems they tell there friends "hey guys some and get it" So i use sort to say preventive measures. If i wait then there all over tree unless i monitor the tree what would seem like hourly and when i see them to apply the tanglefoot which for me would not work very well as they would be in the fruit already.
It seems they like my elm tree's as well so i use tanglefoot on most of my tree's soon as the tree's go out for the season on patio and i can eat a fig fresh off the tree as i admire them without the worry of crawling bugs that dont fly. ; )
Martin

Question for Martin re your experience with the ants.

One of the reasons that I grabbed onto the waiting for the ants to attack approach is a PRESUMPTION that they all return to their nest (at dark I guess; IÂm not an enthomologist). So I figured that even with them feasting on the figs that first day, the loss would be negligible (not that I like putting something in my mouth thatÂs uncooked that the ants have been at even for a little bit); so when I applied Tanglefoot at that point, I presumed that I would nail ALL of them that night as they attempted to return home. Do you know whether 100% return to their nest at night?

An addendum re Tanglefoot irrespective as to where/when used.

I am a hobbyist beekeeper not quite at the end of year 1. I got a quick introduction to honeybees and ants very quickly after I installed the queen. They were of the large black carpenter ant variety. I had built, by my own design, my hive stand out of PVC pipe; basically the stand looks like a box without sides, i. e., a frame (18" high). Since there are vertical pieces of pipe, that worked out ideally for taking duct tape wrapping a piece at the top of the each vertical section, and applying the Tanglefoot to that. It was not that easy on my hands and knees to get the Tanglefoot spread around all 360 degrees of each piece. The ants are NOT stupid. They tried to build a bridge across out of the carcasses of their deceased brethren who did not make it. Fortunately they gave up, but IÂm real glad that I used a wide piece of duct tape (instead of a narrow strip), and copious amounts of the Tanglefoot . Also in a heavy rain, dirt from the ground splashed onto the Tanglefoot (which I solved this year by laying weed fabric cloth all around the hive stand; not sure at this point how I will deal with that with the figs trees). Also at least one neighborhood cat brushed up against one leg and left a whole bunch of fur. Finally, it is VERY EASY to unknowingly brush up against the coating and bring it into the house...I leave it up to your imagination as to what happens then. There were minimal problems with flying insects, leaves, etc.,. Bottom Line: 100% effective against the ants getting to my hive; expect to have equal success with the fig trees.

Fig trees can survive in a cold weather up to -10 C = 15 F.
I have 3 fig trees in the ground burried in a trench then surounded by MS insulations then covered with plastic bags to prevent water to get in. I would remove all of this once the frost is melted in the ground below the surface. If the temp. goes below 15F at night for few hours, I do not think this will harm the tree, to be safe you could use a blanket to cover the tree if the temp. drops.

Kam

Some VERY DETAILED FYI info follow up: I removed the garbage cans, etc., setup yesterday on both my in ground fig trees.

I live in Hardiness Zone 6 with a last frost date of May 1st, but I prefer to use May 15th. I do not have ready access to weather data as to how many days in April the temp will drop below freezing (especially during the daytime), or what the local record is for the low temp for April (a previous post addresses what my plan is if that occurs).

I had filled the leaf mulch all the way up to the top (which was actually the bottom of the garbage can since I inverted it since the real top had a wider diameter and would be more stable in the wind); the leaf level dropped about a foot over the course of the winter (so next year I will mulch the fallen leaves earlier, and store them for a while so they will lose some of their "fluff").

There were some wet leaves, but NO frozen clumps of leaves (which occurs every year in my compost bin which has a much larger capacity and thus takes a longer time to thaw internally). Perhaps the lack of wet leaves, that were at one time frozen, is due in part that the figs are in my front yard which gets the most sun, and the contractor type garbage bags being black, absorbed the sunÂs rays, and dried out some of the wet leaves (the possibility of the sun's rays turning my setup into a miniature oven has NOT escaped my attention).

One tree has a branch (there are only 3 short ones on each) with an obvious new bud; the other not so sure if what I see is a new bud. One tree has some light grey, very thin, like patches that I have no idea as to whether that is mold.

One thing that I noticed is that the area of the ground around the trees was very damp. I suspect that over the course of the winter, and we have a great many freeze-thaw cycles, and rain as much as snow, the ground under the garbage cans froze, & when it thawed it became very damp. And obviously, the garbage cans do NOT create a seal around its perimeter, and IÂm sure that when it rained some water flowed around and under the garbage cans.

I know that there are rodents about, but zero signs of any attempt to get to my fig tree. And there was zero sign of any attempt for a mouse to get to my bee hive; that is a chronic problem area for beekeepers in all areas (along with the entire genus of rodents). No real idea why I was so fortunate.

Thanks to all of you who responded to my original post; hope this FYI helps someone else out there.