Beyond Carrots and Corn - How About an Early-Ripening Fig and a Petite Eggplant?

If the daffodils are pushing up out of the ground and the grocery stores are selling primroses, it must be time to start thinking about new plants....our acquisitive instincts rise with the sap...and no wonder with all the tempting new plants introduced every spring.

In late winter I have the welcome chore of sorting through hundreds of fresh, new kinds of plants for a series of columns in Pacific Northwest magazine. I try to figure out which ones might be worth growing - are they especially fragrant, dwarf, more variegated, bloom earlier or later, stay compact, or more likely to ripen in our cool summers? All these questions come into play. Sure, my choices are subjective, I'm influenced by the visuals and a bit by the marketing hype...but I hope mostly by more years of gardening experience than I prefer to claim.  

The series runs in the magazine starting in early April....in the meantime, here are a couple of flashy new edibles that didn't make it into the column on food plants. Not because they aren't exciting, and perhaps well suited to our climate, but when writing for the old media (on paper) it's always a question of space...how I wish I could have squeezed these two beauties into the mix....

Eggplant ‘Pot Black’ (Solanum melongena) produces glossy black fruit that weigh only 2-3 oz, so they're smaller than Japanese eggplant. The plants fit into a container, so are perfect for the sunniest spot on your deck, preferably where they'll get reflected sunshine. Expect each plant to produce about 30 eggplant, 58-62 days to harvest. Grown by wholesaler Log House Plants in Eugene, Oregon, these covetable little eggplants should be available in most area nurseries later this spring.

This 'Celestial' fig tree (Ficus caricus) is new from Monrovia, even though figs are some of the oldest plants cultivated by humans. 'Celestial' sounds like a smart pick for our climate and smaller gardens, for it stays fairly compact, and requires less heat and time to ripen. The splayed leaves are handsome, the tree grows vigorously to 5-10 feet, and it's reliably hardy to zone 7. The fruit is small and sweet, with purplish-brown skin and white flesh...and they supposedly ripen by mid-June...

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Comments

[Brenda]

Val,
Will the eggplant be available as a start or seed? It is very enticing and something to keep me going during the rain and chill of late february days

[Ellen]

Do you think the fig tree would be small enough to grow in a pot? I'd love to have a fig tree, but the only one I know "personally" is our neighbor's and it's huge.

[valerie Easton]

Hi Ellen,
Because this new fig is smaller than the usual 'Brown Turkey' fig we see around here, and also hardier, it'd be worth a try growing it in a big pot, for a few years, anyway.The best way to control the size and make it easy to harvest the figs, and also enjoy the handsome leaves, is to espalier a fig tree against a warm fence or wall - they adapt well to espalier and it's easy to keep the size manageable...

Have fun with it...I'm trying to figure out a good spot to grow one too...
Val

[valerie Easton]

Hi Brenda,
You might be able to find seed too, but starts will be available from Log House Plants - they're wholesale, so you'll need to find a nursery that carries their plants (Swansons, Bayview on Whidbey, Wells-Medina I think...). And they won't be available until the soil and weather warm up - can't wait to grow one of these on my deck...
Val

[Dghatsnw]

My husband wants figs, so I'll have to research the Celeste because it sounds like it produces only one crop of figs a season, which I suspect is the way to go in places, like mine, marginal for figs, though it's also likely to produce on old wood and winter die back might be an issue then, as I found it to be in espaliering, but the one I had came up readily from the roots, annoyingly even. Hey,nobody told me that fig leaves are fragant when dried and pleasant in potpourri or that they make a nice addition, when used in very small quantites and cooked, in fruit punches. If you've got latex allergies, though, beware.

[Leo Ema]

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