Figs

In my desperate search for a topic this week I hit upon a subject which has bedeviled me for years even as it intrigues me no end. The Fig, or rather the figs in question are the product of two trees on our property that ignore my tender mercies producing copious amounts of fruit which provide for the care and feeding of a wide variety of birds and four legged creatures that inhabit our yard. Mind you, they surrender a meager yield to the two legged variety, and then only a handful that have escaped the nightly raids and early morning gorging. I have pleaded with neighbors to invade my yard at will in the hope of reducing the cast offs that litter the place but to little avail.

The bedeviling part is that despite being ravaged by an extraordinary array of critters, able to reach ripened fruit anywhere on these trees, there are still more that seem to appear quite literally overnight. They spend months as tiny fruit on meager branches and within days when some magical incantation occurs, an amalgam of sun and rain that suits their peevish personality, they insist upon these overnight growth spurts and swell in size to the point of bowing the branches to the ground.

Where once was a path through the yard, overnight there are numerous head banging branches, their concussive presence a vertical obstacle course when I am cleaning up the night's provender. Even on the walkways their sticky sweet bodies --some half chewed others over-ripened to wizened marbles leave behind a residue that is impervious to rain or hose--succumbing only to the attack of the pressure washer in the Fall. So much for the bedeviling part.

Here is what intrigues me. I've read many accounts from master gardeners and nurserymen advising how best to prune trees in general and specifically Fig trees. The first few years I followed their sage counsel, never cutting more than a third of the top- most growth, pruning anything horizontal to the main stems. Forget such advice--it is no match for the profligacy of these contemptuous plants. In recent years I have taken to the chain saw and the lopper, removing massive branches, topping them with vengeance until it would seem they must surrender at last . But despite my ministrations each year the yield is greater, the mess messier, the new growth sturdier and the cloying smell of overripe fruit an ever present cologne inviting flies and beetles, insects of every kind to come sup on the feast.

It is as if nature herself is thumbing her nose at me--reminding me that life is both persistent and ultimately victorious despite men's ravages. These two trees are like the persistent weeds that manage to grow in the slimmest of cracks on a blighted concrete and asphalt expanse. They will be here, I am confident, long after I am mouldering in my grave. I believe them to be immortal.

I am no stranger to farming. For a time I tended an acre or so of vegetable and fruits, sufficient to feed more than a hundred or so year round with both fresh, canned and cellared produce. The rhythm of planting, weeding, tending, harvesting and processing --to say nothing of vigilant policing of various pests and insect sharecroppers is one with which I am intimately familiar. But even were I to obtain a reasonable quantity of these green orbs hanging in my yard I can think of few uses beyond preserves. You see they move from ripe and ready to be eaten to rotten in something less than hours. Even if I could cadge sufficient quantity to render into jam--fighting off the crows and squirrels, raccoons, bunnies and possums, the figs would insist upon surrendering themselves instantly or not at all, preferring compost as their ultimate destination rather than my enjoyment.

I briefly entertained the notion that the legendary Fig Newton was named for the godfather of Physics and the apple of legend was in fact that notorious fruit, but alas it is not the case. I'll save you the effort--they were named for the town of Newton, Massachusetts where the bakery that coined their name was located. Perhaps I'll go there one day and learn their secret, or maybe not. Some things should remain a mystery.