In the YouTube video "How to Pollard a Fig Tree: The Pros, Cons & Alternatives," Ross Raddi thoroughly explains and demonstrates pollarding—a drastic pruning technique where everything above an imaginary horizontal line is cut away to control a fig tree's height. He clearly warns that while it instantly makes a tall tree reachable, it comes with serious downsides: the tree responds with explosive vegetative growth (7–10 feet the following season), shifts energy away from fruit production, delays ripening by about a month, and completely eliminates any chance of a breba (early) crop since those figs form on the previous year's wood that gets removed. For growers in short-season or marginal climates like the UK or Pacific Northwest who depend on that early breba harvest, pollarding can ruin an entire year's production and produce lower-quality, later fruit.
Despite the drawbacks, Ross acknowledges pollarding can make sense in specific situations: commercial growers who need to keep orchards low for easier mechanical harvesting, people taking a more "hands-off" approach who don't mind the annual heavy pruning, or those with very long growing seasons who want an extended (though later and sometimes lower-quality) harvest window. He then demonstrates the technique on one of his own trees, aggressively cutting all laterals back to the main scaffolds while leaving the trunk and primary structure intact. More importantly, he shows a far better alternative for most home growers: instead of pollarding, selectively shorten the tallest branches by cutting them back to lower, outward-facing buds on fruitful wood. This keeps the tree compact without triggering the massive regrowth response, preserves the breba crop, and results in earlier, better-tasting figs the following season—an approach he strongly recommends over routine pollarding for virtually everyone except in the niche cases mentioned.
What is Pollarding? (0:48): Explains pollarding as drawing an imaginary horizontal line and removing everything above it, primarily to control tree height.
The Major Downside – Explosive Regrowth (1:10): After pollarding, fig trees typically explode with 7–10 feet of new growth the following season, requiring the exact same heavy prune every single year forever.
How Pollarding Ruins Fruiting (1:45): The tree shifts energy from fruit production to vegetative growth, ripening occurs ~1 month later, and fruit quality declines.
Why Pollarding Completely Eliminates Your Breba Crop (2:07): Breba figs form on last year’s wood; pollarding removes all of it, so growers in marginal climates (UK, Pacific Northwest, etc.) can lose their entire early crop.
Lower Fruit Quality & Longer (But Later) Harvest Window (2:49): Remaining main-crop figs are larger but less flavorful, and harvesting stretches out over a longer period. The Actual Benefits of Pollarding (3:07): Extended harvest window, easier picking height, and a somewhat lazier annual maintenance approach.
Who Should Actually Pollard Their Trees (3:31): Best suited for commercial growers, people with extremely long seasons, or those who want to revitalize old/neglected trees and don’t mind annual heavy pruning.
The Much Better Alternative for Home Growers (4:00): Instead of pollarding, selectively cut tall branches back to lower outward-facing buds on mature wood to control height without sacrificing fruit quality or breba crop.
Live Pollarding Demonstration (4:48): Ross aggressively pollards a tall in-ground fig tree, cutting all laterals back to the main scaffolds and trunk.
After Pollarding – The Finished Tree (5:52): Shows the dramatically shortened tree and explains why leaving some small stubs with apical buds gives the best of both worlds.
Conclusion & Follow-Up Next Year (6:18): Wrap-up, reminder to like/subscribe, and promise to show this exact tree’s regrowth the following season so viewers can see the real results.
All right, fig lovers. Today, we're
going to polard a fig tree. We're going
to talk about why this could be a good
thing for you or a very bad thing for
you. So, before we begin this video, my
cutting sale starts November 30th at
2:00 p.m. Eastern Standard Time. I'm
actually doing that today where I'm
going to be cutting a lot of my trees
back. I would recommend being there for
the time of the sale because these
cutings go really quick and a lot of
varieties I might not have a whole lot
of cutings from, so they're going to go
even quicker. Let's get back to the
video. Hope you enjoy it. First of all,
what is polarding? Well, has your spouse
ever had the idea to draw an imaginary
line across whatever it is that they're
pruning and then prune everything above
that line? The line could be at your
head, your chest, your waist, whatever
the height is. They're removing
everything above that imaginary line.
Now, what exactly is the purpose of
polarding? Well, the main purpose a lot
of people think about is actually
reducing the height of their fig tree.
So, if your tree is too tall and you
can't reach it, well, if you just cut it
back really far and cut all the branches
back really far, well, then it's
obviously shorter this upcoming season.
The problem is with polarding anything
is that you have to consistently do it
every year. As I polard this, next year,
the tree is going to grow 7 to 10 feet.
Yeah. So, if you don't prune your fig
tree again back to that original
imaginary line that you guys draw, well,
now it's going to grow from 7 to 10 feet
tall and it's going to become a very
large fig tree very quickly and it's
going to become such a beast that you're
going to be like, "Oh no, what do I do
now?" Now, that's the main reason why I
don't recommend it to people is because
after you pullard, the natural response
of your fig tree is to really want to
put on a lots of growth. And so, because
your fig tree now favors growth, it's
now going to not favor fruiting. And
your fruits, by the way, if they do
ripen after doing this technique, will
be about a month later than normal. So,
if you're going to be in a cold climate,
a short season climate, and you're going
to do this technique, well, you're
probably going to miss out on the fruit
set, the other thing you're doing by
pruning away the branches is that you're
removing the brava crop or at least any
chance that you can ripen the brava
crop. Now, the brava crop ripens 30 to
45 days earlier than the main crop. So,
it's right now it's present here on
these branches. And if your variety
produces Brava or you rely on the Brava
crop, well now you just pruned it all
away. So people in mild places like the
United Kingdom or San Francisco, let's
say, well, you just completely ruined
your crop next year because someone told
you to polard your fig tree. The other
thing that will happen because your fig
tree is going to grow a lot is that your
fruits are going to be of a lower
quality. They're generally going to be
larger and your tree is going to want to
grow all throughout the season and it
will continuously fruit if it's going to
fruit and you will actually have a
longer harvest window. So, there are
benefits, don't get me wrong. Um, but
for the average home grower to recommend
to them, yes, you should be polarding
your fig tree in all situations is just
completely false and would be totally
misleading. So, this technique is really
for people who want to take a bit of a
lazier approach. They also maybe might
be a commercial grower or they're
somebody who needs to revitalize their
fig tree or they're somebody who has a
very long growing season. So, now you
might be wondering, I'm going to show
you the technique in a minute, but you
might be wondering, well, Ross, if I
can't reduce the height of my fig tree
by polarding it, how do I do that? You
want to trace back, let's say, the
tallest point on your fig tree, like
this branch here, and trace it back to
its lowest point. So, as an example, if
I wanted to make my fig tree shorter, I
could come in here with my pruning
shears and make a cut right there flush
with the growth below it. Now, what's
left behind are two fruing branches with
apical buds. the top third of your
growth is going to be the growth that's
going to grow a lot slower next year.
So, not only is it going to grow slower,
it's going to fruit better earlier. The
fruits are going to taste better. Um, I
can also come in here to this branch
again, make the cut right there, and now
again, the tree is shorter without
messing up the growth next year. Now,
let's actually go ahead and polard this
thing. We're going to use our saw for
this. And we're going to come in here
and just kind of almost willy-nilly,
we're just going to draw an imaginary
line. I want to leave the scaffolds
intact. I want to leave the main trunk
intact. Uh, so I'm going to cut the
laterals back.
Here's some growth there. Come in here
with my pruning shears on this one.
That's going to come out. That's going
to come out. Let's take this whole thing
out.
Now, this one here, I'm actually going
to take this lateral really far back.
It is encroaching into the other tree
next to it.
So all my cuts are to outward facing
buds.
This is some dead dead wood over here.
Take this out.
All right. All right. So, now we have a
polarded fig tree. You can see I've cut
everything back to the laterals. I left
the main trunk alone.
Also left the scaffolds alone. And now
we have
a severely cut back fig tree that's
probably now half the height that it
was. Um, so you're kind of getting a
little bit of the best of both worlds
just by leaving some of these little
branches here, these apical buds intact.
All right, fig lovers. So, there you
have it. That's a polarded fig tree.
Those are the pros and cons of doing
this method. Hope you guys enjoyed it.
We're going to update you guys on how
this tree actually grows next year. That
way, you can really see it for yourself.
Thank you guys here for watching. Please
do me a favor, hit the like button,
subscribe button, and check out the
booklet I've created on choosing a fig
variety. on.
