Fig Tree

A while back, I learned that figs will grow in our Pacific Northwest climate. Any time I can grow more of our own food, especially something healthy and unusual, I like to give it a try. So last weekend we bought a fig tree.

This tree is about 6 feet tall and almost 2 inches in diameter at the base. The trunk’s thickness makes me think it’s a little more mature than our other fruit trees were when we bought them. It’s dormant; it has no leaves yet this spring. It has no branches yet either; it’s just a big, sturdy-looking twig, rooted in a pot. Still, the nursery owner said we might get some figs from it this very first year. Yahoo!

Last night I went web surfing, looking for nutrition information, and growing and planting tips for figs. I thought I remembered, from an article I read several years ago, that figs are high in a form of iron that is readily absorbable to the body. Maybe I could find that information again.

One of the first articles I came across said that most figs come from Turkey and Greece and that they grow on the Ficus tree. I had no idea what a fig tree looks like with leaves and branches, but we have a fake (silk) Ficus tree in the living room. So I was thinking that’s how it will look later in the summer.

I asked my husband, “Did you know that a Ficus tree is a fig tree?”

“Yes,” he replied. “Didn’t’ Little Bo Peep climb up the fig tree to look at Jesus?”

I nearly spit a mouthful of almonds across the room! When I could speak again, I said, “That was Zacchaeus, not Little Bo Peep, and it was a Sycamore tree.”

He said, “Sycamore? Same thing, probably.”