Christine every year brings new twists in my zone for growing figs from cold winter weather to summer drought to soggy soil in spring and fall. I have about 60 fig trees in ground without any protection from northerly winds that are still under observation but most seem to dieback in winter. in our zone Brown Turkey, Celeste, and Hardy Chicago aka Chicago Hardy are hardy and fairly easy to find. There are others like Asurup, Gillette, Hungarian Brown Plate, Lyndhurst White, Macool, Marsellis VS black, Red italian frank's strain , Si Emma, St Rita, Tacoma Violet, Violette Dauphine, and maybe few others that seem hardy but finding them can be hard and costly. I hate to say the prices I've paid for some of my fig trees but some rare ones go for well over $300 for a 1 gallon plant. Most of my plants will eventually be in ground but at the moment I'm still testing small plantings to see what's works and what don't. I've already lost about 40 or 50 varieties completely over the years but most that have dieback do comeback. there are some favorites I have that I know are not hardy and will be kept in pots forever but pots are high maintenance so I only intend on keeping about 20 or so in large pots. right now I have around 700+ fig trees in pots at different stages of growth from rooted cuttings to 20 gallon pots. The bad thing is I preach the importance of diversity in the landscape yet I've managed to create a fig monoculture of sorts but as the years pass and the ones that prove to be a problem are gone that number will be much lower. I also sell and trade a lot of plants so these numbers are always changing.
