It could be two things, it was too cold for them to root, or something like grubs ate the roots. When I tried rooting in a garden bed over the winter, much of the cuttings. the roots were eaten by grubs. Some cuttings that was way more obvious than others.
I think you set them out too early. Next year try setting them out a couple of weeks before the fig trees bud out in your area. Also, a partly shaded area would be good early on. I would stick the rest of them in pots and give them a shot, maybe recut them below a node and let them stand in a few inches of water for a day before planting.
My first attempt at rooting figs looks to be going ok. These are Ronde de Bordeaux:
Once they are ready to plant out, Iām planning to plant the entire clump as a single unit rather than trying to separate them. Is there any reason that wonāt work out? Iām assuming they will form natural root grafts rather than competing/harming each other in such close proximity?
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My advice is to be patient and wait longer than you think you should once leaves star growing. I imagine they would be fine as a clumpā¦
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I always cut the potting mix 50% with pumice to avoid rot.
Also
I use a heat mat 16 hours a day.
Excess moisture is really bad.
Iāve been using exclusively diatomaceous earth for the majority of my cuttings. For those Iāve cut with 10% coconut coir, Iāve had significantly less success. Lesson learned, go with what you know!
What do you all say now about up potting my two largest fig cuttings ?
They are 10 to 12 inches tall now and have leaves 5 inches long ?
Our frost danger is pastā¦ I would really like to up pot them and slowly transition them to outside.
These have been rooting since Feb 13.
Those look ready for sure. Give the other ones another week. Bet they are fine too. Usually when you think they look ready, wait another week 
If you have a few inches of stem, they must have decent roots.
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My experience with figs has consistently been that if itās too cold for top growth itās too cold for root growth.
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@swincher those may form root grafts when they are larger, but at that stage Iāve found they are easy to separate if you wait until theyāre dormant in the fall if you decide to go that route. Here is a picture of when I had some extra cuttings and just put them in a pot then pulled them out when they were dormant.
I knocked the dirt off, untangled them, and cut the ends off some very long roots, then potted them all up separately. Doing that will give you some spares you can keep in containers in case your in ground fig dies.
Also, be aware that young figs are going to be much less cold hardy, so I think if possible you are better off growing in a container this year and then planting out next year when they are larger and can size up reasonably before winter.
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@TNHunter I would see if you can slide the largest one out and check the roots. I prefer to wait until the roots have tied the soil together enough that I can pot up without disturbing the roots. If there are fewer roots than you expect it can really stress a young cutting.
Here is an I-258 cutting from last year at about 2 months old. The lighting isnāt great, but it had a lot of roots and a solid root ball so it was transplanted without missing a beat.
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Good to know! I doubt Iāll need to worry too much about cold here, we rarely get cold enough to kill most figs (I think?). This last winter was unusual with a low of 16Ā°F, most winters donāt go under 20Ā°, and many winters donāt drop below the upper 20s. Iām expecting a pretty crowded greenhouse with all the avocado trees next winter, so trying to minimize the number of other things Iāll be putting in there.
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@zendog ā¦ I have not done anything to them yetā¦ I have propigated so much stuff this springā¦ already used all my 2 gal pots (10 of them).
Got more ordered.
I will check them like that when I do consider uppotting.
Thanks
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My coir rotted, my diatomaceous earth has done well. Figs, gooseberries, currants, grapes, much less loss and it is usually cutting quality that does them in. Some questionables even made it in DE.
Iām glad to hear it!!! I hope some of those I sent survive 
@Drew51 did us a service by advocating for the use of DE.
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Here are the results of my lazy method using old oatmeal containers. I lost a few from user error or just not paying attention, but plenty to gift etc. I have a few cuttings Iām a little more cautious about wanting to make sure they succeed, so I might try the DE method on a few of those.
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Has anyone ever tried a lazy manās aquaponics approach to rooting figs? I threw a bunch of fig branches I saw on someoneās yard waste pile into my goldfish pond, one of them has buds swelling and roots forming, guess itās time to put it in the ground?
I wasnāt really expecting it to work, just was messing around. This is the one that my 9 year old claimed as his magical scepter, maybe I can convince him itāll work even better after it grows into a tree to make many more scepter branches.
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Up potted my two largest fig cuttings this evening. The bottom half of each pot had lots of rootsā¦ and a few in the top half too. The one I did not get a pic of its rootsā¦ had quite a few more than the one pictured.
3 hours later no sign of wiltingā¦ looking happy.
Those are 2.6 gal potsā¦ a nice mix of garden dirt and compost anf some composted manureā¦ and my usuall organic fertilizer combo. Bone meal blood meal gypsum greensand epsomsalt.
Questionā¦ how long to leave that parafilm on the cutting ā¦ should I remove that soon or leave it a while longer ?
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I was told just leave the parafilm to fall off itself. I use Buddy tape, but that is what it will do/did do on apple.
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