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| Contents |
| Figs
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Common Fig leaves and fruit | ||||||||||||
| Scientific classification | ||||||||||||
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| Species | ||||||||||||
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About 800, including: Ficus altissima Ficus americana Ficus aurea Ficus benghalensis - Indian Banyan Ficus benjamina - Weeping Fig Ficus broadwayi Ficus carica - Common Fig Ficus citrifolia Ficus drupacea Ficus elastica Ficus godeffroyi Ficus grenadensis Ficus hartii Ficus lyrata Ficus macbrideii Ficus microcarpa - Chinese Banyan Ficus nota Ficus obtusifolia Ficus palmata Ficus prolixa Ficus pumila Ficus racemosa Ficus religiosa - Bodhi tree Ficus rubiginosa - Port Jackson fig Ficus stahlii Ficus sycomorus Ficus thonningii Ficus tinctoria Ficus tobagensis Ficus triangularis Ficus trigonata Ficus ulmifolia Ficus vogelii | ||||||||||||
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Ref: ITIS 19081
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A fig fruit is derived from a specially adapted flowerA flower is the reproductive organ of those plants classified as angiosperms ( flowering plants; Division Magnoliophyta). The function of a flower is to produce seeds through sexual reproduction''. For the higher plants, seeds are the next generation, and. The fruit has a bulbous shape (an accessory fruit called a syconium) with a small opening (the ostiole) in the end and a hollow area inside lined with small red edible seeds. The fruit/flower is pollinated by small wasps that crawl through the opening to fertilise the fruit.
The Common Fig Ficus carica, a native of southwest Asia ( Turkey east to Afghanistan), is cultivated for its fruit. In the United States, figs are grown in California, Texas, Utah, Oregon, and Washington. Figs can be eaten fresh or dried, and used in jam-making.
Figs come in two sexes: hermaphrodite (called caprifigs because only goats eat them) and female. Fig wasps grow in caprifigs; when they mature, they mate, and the females leave in search of immature figs to lay their eggs in. When the wasp finds one, she pollinates the female flowers but will not lay eggs in the edible fig, only in the caprifig. Thus the edible fig ripens without any wasp frass in it.
When a caprifig ripens, another caprifig must be ready to be pollinated. Tropical figs bear continuously, enabling fruit-eating animals to survive the time between masts. In temperate climes, wasps hibernate in figs, and there are distinct crops. Caprifigs have three crops per year; edible figs have two. The first of the two is small and is called breba; the breba figs are olynths.