Fig pruning

There's a huge and ancient breva fig (and this page) here, that has not been pruned in many many years. We are very happy with this tree because it offers both a lot of shade, and very nice figs twice(!) a year. But, if you do nothing eventually branches will break off, or you may lose the whole tree. And, you need to prune trees like this so they grow new branches, and new branches bear more and better figs. Luckily fig wood is rather soft, so with a pair of pruning shears and a wood saw it is not too hard to do, even for an amateur as engineer Jansen.

More than 20 branches were cut off, and the side shoots collected in a wheelbarrow as kindling. So far two wheelbarrows! Which makes our British neighbour with wood stove very happy.

I've seen pruned figs in the neighbourhood here, and even while I cut off 20 fat branches, I should cut off much more. Well, next year. I don't want to overdo this, as the tree bleeds a little bit (white sap) with some cuts, and there's a limit to what a tree can stand.