This video offers practical advice on how to accelerate the growth of a planted fig tree using a technique called ground layering. By laying the tree's stem horizontally along the ground and pinning it down with long garden staples, growers can encourage root formation at multiple nodes along the buried stem.
Another method suggested is using a tomato cage to hold branches outward and against the ground. Once the branches are pinned, the center of the cage can be filled with soil to encourage additional rooting. Both techniques help significantly expand the root zone, leading to a more vigorous fig tree capable of producing more productive branches in a wider area, and reaching more sunlight.
Intro & sales mention (0:00): Brief intro and mention of fig trees available for sale.
Ground layering trick (0:38): Introduces ground layering as a method to speed up fig tree growth.
Bending and pinning (1:01): Explains how to lay the tree sideways, pin it with garden staples, and cover it with soil.
Soil vs mulch (1:32): Recommends dense soil over mulch for better moisture contact and root formation.
Root expansion (1:55): Describes how buried nodes will root and help expand the root system horizontally.
Organic material advice (2:15): Encourages generous use of organic material; introduces tomato cage method.
Tomato cage method (2:32): Explains how to use a tomato cage to hold branches down and cover them with soil.
Alright fig lovers, this is Ross the Fig Boss.
If you just planted a fig tree, this is the video for you.
Because today's video, we're going to talk about how to make your fig tree grow faster
now that you've planted it.
So before we get into the video, I just want to announce that I have a lot of fig trees
for sale.
There's probably a good 100 to 150 on my blog, figboss.com.
There's a really great selection right now.
Some of my favorite varieties, there are varieties there for pretty much every climate.
If you're interested, go check it out.
I'd really appreciate it.
And don't be afraid to ask me what variety that I would recommend for your climate.
Now one of the absolute best ways to get your fig tree to grow faster is to do something
called ground layering.
And so ground layering is very similar to the concept that we talked about in the planting
video that we published recently, is that when you have a fig tree, you can plant the
fig tree kind of sideways, so you can turn the root ball so that the stem of the tree
is growing along the ground.
And this will allow you to pin it to the ground.
I have these garden staples.
You want to get ones that are as long as possible.
There's different sizes of them.
I think nine inches is probably right, but again, I'll put a link to that in the description.
And then all we want to do once we pin it to the ground is we want to cover it as much
of this as possible with soil, mulch, anything we've got.
Soil is probably better.
The more dense the material is, the better the contact of water is going to be along
the branches.
And the better the contact of water, the quicker and better it's going to root along the stem.
So every node and every node that we bury will potentially form roots.
It should form roots.
And that way we're expanding the root system away from where we originally planted it,
making the root system wider.
When you have a wider root system instead of something that's rather small, well, then
you can have branches that sprout up from over here.
You can have branches that sprout up here and over here.
That makes them get more sunlight.
You can't really get too carried away with organic material.
You can really pile this up.
Don't be afraid to.
So there's also another way to do it.
You can use a tomato cage.
And just like this, we've basically got the branches of our tree that we want to propagate
and expand or make stronger.
We place them here outwards, and then we put the tomato cage over top.
We press the tomato cage down, and all of the branches are now attached to the ground.
And this can be, basically now what I'll do is I'll fill in this middle area here with
soil in the middle of the tomato cage, and everything in here will root along the ground
in that soil.
We will lose some leaves in here, so that's not ideal.
What I probably will let happen is allow the tree to grow out further away from the tomato
cage before adding the soil.
So that's the lesson for today here, guys, on planting.
This is gold, honestly.
I know this stuff works.
I've been doing it for years.
It's going to work for you.
It's going to work for everybody.
Thanks for watching this one.
Please do me a favor.
Hit the like button.
Hit the subscribe button.
And, you know, check out the fig trees I have for sale if you're interested.
Thanks again, guys.
