Ficus triangularis variegata with fruit!

[Heather]

Hey y’all!
So, working back in the plant world again since March and it’s only taken a short time for the plant bug to bite again! We have a bad habit of sending employees home with free plants! Gateway drugs….anyway, one free plant has led me to think I can grow things and so now I have about 30. Just starting to think about orchids again now that I’m in the mood to care again. Anyway, one of my new friends seems happy and has graced me with fruit! Neat huh? Doubt they will get much bigger than this. Ficus triangularis variegata. Southeast facing window.

 

[DrLeslieEe]

Nice plant! Where’s the fruit?

 

[KyushuCalanthe]

Nice plant! Where’s the fruit?

They're in the vid man, the vid.

Welcome back into the world of addiction Heather, but pace yourself. It took some time, but I managed to locate actual science-based information on this species among the litter of people peddling stuff. It is a native of central Africa from Cameroon, Equatorial Guinea, and westward to Gambia, Sierra Leone and Senegal. Listed as growing up to 80 tall.

 

[DrLeslieEe]

Oh those tiny green berries lol. I couldn't see on the phone but saw on the desktop screen.

 

[KyushuCalanthe]

They're in the vid man, the vid.

Welcome back into the world of addiction Heather, but pace yourself. It took some time, but I managed to locate actual science-based information on this species among the litter of people peddling stuff. It is a native of central Africa from Cameroon, Equatorial Guinea, and westward to Gambia, Sierra Leone and Senegal. Listed as growing up to 80 feet tall.

 

[Carmella.carey]

We have a fig orchard and if anyone is interested I can explain fig sex but here is a picture from September and in the background of this maxima is a Ficus carica 'Celeste' covered in "fruit"
-Patrick

 

[KyushuCalanthe]

We have a fig orchard and if anyone is interested I can explain fig sex but here is a picture from September and in the background of this maxima is a Ficus carica 'Celeste' covered in "fruit"
-PatrickView attachment 37263

Ooo... fig sex... I think that goes beyond the boundaries of this forum, but by all means I'm all, uhh, ears?

 

[Carmella.carey]

Ok so, a fig isn't like other fruit be cause although it flowers you never see the flowers just little green figs that seem to magically appear then in a few months ripen. But a fig is actually an inverted infloressence
An outside in flower spike with thousands of little blooms inside the small green figlets in early spring. Have you ever heard that when you eat a fig that there is a dead wasp inside it? Well... This is why just like with other trees there are male & female trees the males let off pollen while the females flower and produce fruit... now on to the pollinator, ficus are pollinated by small little tiny fig-wasps (they look like fungas knats) a mature female fig-wasp goes into a male fig via the "eye" of the fig to lay her eggs in this process
Her wings and some legs brake off. once inside she lays her eggs but her life cycle is over and she dies. Over the next several hours the dead wasp is broken down by inzimes and the body becomes one with the fig. Her children hatch and bour tunnels through the fig to the outside world the female wasps are impregnated and go into a female fig with their bodies covered in male fig pollen they go inside pollinate most of the little blooms in side of the fig and Wala! A fig.
Most of what we call "common figs" or modern cultivars are self fertile so you only need a female tree to have fruit. So that little potted ficus with out a tree of the opposite sex and fig wasps the figlets will just wither and fall off.
-Patrick

 

[Carmella.carey]