Persimmons, I know there are folks who grow figs in New England, but I am not sure if any of them check in here. There is a fairly active fig forum that should have some suggestions for growing hardy figs in zone 6.

I've got a "Brown Turkey" fig that my parents gave me a couple years ago. I overwintered it successfully last year (I'm just ouside Boston) by cutting it down to a couple feet and wrapping it in loose mulch and burlap. It died down to a couple inches, but survived and pushed out several feet of growth. Did the same this past winter, and, although it's too early to see new growth, it looks like it survived okay, with less die-back.

You're unlikely to get figs to ripen in New England, unless you keep the tree in a pot and overwinter it indoors.

Persimmons, I've had a fig tree for years. I don't know the variety since it was given to me by my grandfather a looooooooooooong time ago! I used to try to protect it in winter, and it helped a bit, and I sometimes got a decent "crop" of ripe figs. But for several years now, I have not been able to do all that work, but it survives unprotected. Even with this past horrible winter, it is alive and well near the base, so it will resprout once again. But I rarely get any figs to ripen, and treat it as a dieback plant that I keep for ornamental and sentimental reasons.

Having said all this, I would plan on giving your "Olympian" a very sheltered spot and a lot of winter protection. As wonderful as Logee's is (and I've been going there since the early '70's), in the past few years it seems that Byron Martin (current owner) tends to overstate the hardiness of a few items, or understates the necessity of protection. It happened to me with "Gardenia Diamond's Fragrant Delight". When it first appeared in a catalog a few years ago, as a "NEW" item, it was rated for zone 6, with NO MENTION of needing protection, etc. $29.95 later, I was glad that I had decided to keep it in a pot indoors for the first winter, to get it to a better size before planting it out. The next year's catalog no longer listed it as zone 6 hardy, but rather as zone 8. Luckily, I never did plant it out but still have it as a houseplant that goes out in summer only. You will now see it in the current as well as the online catalog as zone 8.

So I would encourage you to plan on sufficient protection for winter, even though they are saying at Logee's that it is zone 6 hardy. Good luck!

My plan for the fig tree based on this advice and the look of the plant currently:

It needs a new home now that it's a big large for the pot it came in from Logee's. I have a 6" pot that I will root a clipping of the tree into, and maintain the tree as a bonsai or ornamental house plant until it's large enough to bucket up and become a true, fruit-bearing specimen.

As for the mother plant itself, I'm planting it on a southern facing, concrete surrounded corner of my house. I've been growing two plants there for a few years: nepeta and boxwood. The boxwood was mostly a filler plant--no space else to put it, and nothing else to put in that space--so it will be moved to a new location. I'm planning to divide the nepeta and move pieces about my vegetable and orchard gardens to encourage pollination. I'll double dig in finished compost, and pop in the fig tree. If it pushes up multiple feet of growth, it will fill in this space ornamentally. I don't mind about winter die-back, and am actually looking forward to the challenge it will introduce: what do I plant behind it to add winter interest?

So the garden evolves...