I did some research about figs in Canada and the west coast is where you'll see fig trees loaded with crop. It's amazing what they can do on the west coast. There are bay leaf trees, 30-foot palm trees, huge laurels, huge rhododendrons, tall bamboo!, redwood, eucalyptus and of course figs... with a second crop!? I can't find much about Ontario figs but they need forms of protection. I'm reading about climate and the west coast winters are much milder than Ontario's but the coast has cooler summers than the BC interior and southern Ontario. But in pure irony bamboo and palm trees grow with ease on the BC coast. They have grapes and wineries on Vancouver Island. Rosemary is evergreen there. I like video evidence. Videos of figs on a BC west coast island or palm trees swaying in the wind in Vancouver tells a bigger story than was ever told before the Internet existed. Retiring gardeners should explore the west coast online at the very least. Here is a link that might be useful: Figs galore in BC

I had a couple in large pots on my patio for a few years. The first year they did well and fruited but the fruit was less-than-wonderful. Add to that the trees/ bushes did not like living in a pot and one died, the other stunted despite all my efforts to attend to it. Like I said, the fruit was just OK, and I didn't want to kill it so after 3+ years of languishing in the pot I planted it in the ground and I'm waiting for it to fruit again. It's looking good, lots of new leaves but it'll take a while to fruit I think. I'm going to buy other types of fig, this one I wouldn't buy again. Lesson learned? put them in the ground :-)

i wouldnt doubt it because there are naturalized parrots in many cool areas. Brooklyn is a zone 7 and has parrots thriving in some communities. They are in abundance too but arent very widespread and live together. Just like all other city birds they eat a lot of food that is on the ground but will eat a lot of other foods too. They dont look like tropical parrots, but can be trained to talk, but probably will never do so in the wild. Definitely not those beautiful tropical looking parrots you see as pets or in the zoo, but they do have nice green colors to them. But as far as stealing fruit, there are lots of other much more common birds that will do that job a lot quicker than these parrots in brooklyn (I believe they are called quaker parrots and are from argentina). I think they are also in other areas but Im really only familiar with the ones in Brooklyn. Good luck! -Alex

Vladimir, all depends on the size of the tree. Rick, Claire is right. planting it now would encourage the tree to put on some new growth which most likely will not harden off by the time the cold weather arrives. i would store your trees this winter just like you have in the past and then get them in the ground once they break dormancy in the spring as long as there is no longer a threat of frost. All my trees are in 20 gallon pots with maybe 1 or 2 going into the ground possibly next year. all my trees are 4yrs old started from cuttings. as for fertilizer, i give them spring application right around the time they are starting to wake up using Joe Morles recipe. then roughly a month after that i start feeding them every other week with a liquid fish fertilizer called Organic Gem. I stop feeding them mid august just so that they don't put on much new growth. i also sprinkle a handful of garden lime 1-2 times during the season into each pot. once frost hits and all the fig leaves fall off i usually leave the tree outside to get a couple more light frosts to help harden off the new wood. once majority of the new green wood has turned brown, i bring them into my detached garage where they will stay all winter. i dont cover them nor do i provide any heat for them. matter of fact every time it snows its my sons job to place 2-3 grapefruit sized snowballs on each pot to assure that the soil never goes dry. it typically take up to a week for the snowballs to completely melt. sorry for the rambling....