I ordered a 4 pack of fig tree sprouting off amazon but I’m not sure I have enough pots to put them in until I move to a place where I can plant them in the ground. i have always liked the braided look of tree trunks and wondered if it’s possible to braid the different varieties of fig together so as they grow they fuse. Will it change the type of fruit, or will they make their separate fruit on different branches? Will they strangle each other and die?
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This doesn’t really answer your question, but there is are multiple species of figs that can do that naturally (strangler figs). Assuming you got the common fig, I am not sure if they would do too well in the same pot for a long time. They are very vigorous growers and the roots would definitely be competing with one another in a pot. The branches “fusing” together is physically possible, but its more likely one branch would rot/dry out and break. Also it would only be superficial, the plants genetics wouldn’t mix together, the bark at wherever they are rubbing each other just combines.
That being said, the only way to truly know is to try it. It is not something I attempted.
The fruit wouldn’t change, it would be one of the two fruits, depending on which plant the branch is from. If they strangled each other, it would be underground with the roots, not because of the branches.
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When branches of vascular plants fuse, it is not homogeneous. It is akin to grafting, in fact the botanical term is adjacency graft. It is a naturally occurring phenomenon in nature.
With several non-Ficus species in nature, the result is two branches grafted together and served by resources coming up from two separate root systems.
Ficus carica are usually aggressive. Two individuals in the same pot will eventually engage in a root war with one or both dieing.
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I wonder how it would work if they were braided and fused in 2 separate containers?
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In some plant species (not figs), it is the only means of macroscopic cloning.
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I am not sure which kinds they are yet, I just ordered them not too long ago and they haven’t arrived yet but when they do I’ll update this post. I just know its a variety pack of figs, I got them because the figs from the store taste ladybuggy and I grew up with a neighbor who had figs that were the best snack ever so I wanted to try growing them myself now that I am a mom.
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Ita more than likely a a common fig (f. carica), as it is really the only one grown for food. Now there is probably a thousand varieties of the common fig, but species wise they are all the same. Most of the other species aren’t really for sale except rubber fig and fiddleleaf fig, which are indoor ornamentals, or if you live in a specific area (Florida Strangler figs can be bought in South Florida for example).
I think someone posted a picture of a greenhouse with espalier figs all grafted to one another??? Did I dream this up or does anybody remember seeing it. It was either here or ourfigs??
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That makes a lot of sense!! I don’t know too much about growing trees but I have heard figs do well here so I wanted to try it!!
Is this the one that you are thinking of?
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That’s how it’s done!
This is a low cordon /step over us northerners learned to do for less winter dieback. There are other benefits to that system.
To answer the OP, yes you absolutely can put them in the same pot for now but they will not be happy long term.
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This is the Japanese method for production agriculture. They’ve been doing it for centuries.
I believe the OP had something else in mind.
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They root extremely well from cuttings and i personally went from, i wanna see how different varieties taste…
To well over 1k invested over the last few months and that doesn’t even include the pots or potting soil.
Be careful with Amazon. You have to check the sellers to make sure they’re not from another country sometimes. The good ones will usually put the variety in the description somewhere.
There’s some really good fig sellers on the forum as well and I haven’t been disappointed with anyone I’ve gotten cuttings from.
There’s also a few good sellers on Etsy and Facebook as well. Figs for sale in usa, there’s a guy named smatthew and a sweet couple named leanne and Victor that are super nice and affordable. There’s a really funny lady called Luby that’s always posting funny things too but she doesn’t sell anything. She’s just a pleasant person i like seeing updates on lol.
Etsy: https://www.etsy.com/shop/Zone9Tropical this girl has been great to me as well.
FruitNut on here has great cuttings as well. All of these sources are reasonably priced too.
Most unnamed figs I’ve found out in my early days… are Olympian, brown turkey, mission, and sometimes Celeste. Except Celeste, i think all of these other ones in this paragraph are mostly bland.
For honey/sugar variety, hollier and florea have been the best that I’ve tried.
Berry: The One but this is proving kind of hard to get. Black Madeira and white marseilles have been pretty good as well.
Rooting fig cuttings has been my gateway drug to rooting everything else haha. And the local fig tasting we had in the pnw in 2024 have been my ultimate gateway drug to the fig collection…
I don’t think it’s a good idea to braid them together although they look nice. At this point, i wanna know who’s who and who tastes best to i can give it just a little more extra 
there’s such a wide range of flavors for figs that i didn’t know existed until last year.
My grandma had a neighbor who had a great fig tree as well that had delicious figs. No idea what variety it is though and i think they chopped down the tree since then but I still remember that fig tree’s fruit too.
I did have a bit of a different idea in mind but that is a really cool concept!!! I’m just a beginner at tree growing mostly inspired by my daughter’s love for fruits!!
this is what I was thinking of when saying braided
Unless it’s the same variety, every variety has a slightly different amount of, or lack of vigor.
I’ve been told that unless you’re adamant about keeping them in check, typically one will take over and dwarf or kill the other one. Also the nutrient competition will make it so that they can’t get to their best flavors i presume.
In my opinion, it may be best to have multiple plants or graft different varieties onto one tree vs braiding anything. As pretty as it looks, i feel like doing anything like that to a plant would make it less productive overall.
Also fiddle leaf fig is a different beast in itself. I wouldn’t relate anything to fiddle leaf figs from the edible fig varieties other than the name “fig” and “ficus” and the fact that they’re in the same plant family. Other than that, a fiddle leaf fig can die if you fart in the wrong direction. An edible fig would be like “cool story bro”.
The main reason I wanted to braid my trees is because I lack space, I probably won’t try it because I want to have a healthy tree but the idea was a cool concept. Other than how hardy fig trees are I don’t know much about them so I’m trying to learn as much as possible before spring officially hits us.
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I’ve heard they do great with grafting. As long as you keep them in pots, they’ll naturally dwarf themselves as well. I’ve never tried grafting figs but then you can have multiple varieties on the same tree 
What’s the size of the area that you have dedicated for them?
Pots for now, we plan on moving in the next year or so and I don’t want to plant them in the ground and leave them behind.
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