BENSON'S 



Guide to Kig Culture 



AND CATALOGUE OF 



ALBE RT R. MANN 



LIBRARY 

 THE f IG FOf^ THE JNO^T^. 



~^^Cm:NEI,l UNIVERSM^ 



ECAUSE of its great produftiveness, adaptability to our climate, the 

 ease with which it can be grown, and it* entire exemption from 

 all insect enemies and disease, the Fig commends itself to the 

 attention of every one who grows fruit, in all pa:rts of the North- 

 ern States. After giving ^ the subject my attention for several 

 years, and thoroughly testing the matter, I am convinced that no 

 fruit will prove so profitable, or will yield so large or sure crops, 

 in our Middle and Northern States, as the Fig, and were the facts, 

 in regard to it generally known, it would soon be as commonly 

 grown as any other fruit; Knowing the value of this luscious fruit 

 for the North, I shall endeavor to give such full instructions for its 

 culture, that no one can fail to grow it successfully. 



WH^lcT THE fIG IS. 



With us the Fig {Ficus Carica) is a deciduous shrub ; it is indigenous to Asia 

 and Northern Africa, and is one of the oldest cultivated fruits. The fruit is gener- 

 ally shortly turbinate, or shaped like a top inverted ; others are of elongated pear shape 

 and some are round. The color is either black, blue, brown, purple, violet, white 

 or yellow . It consists, of a hollow, fleshy receptacle, with an orifice in the top which 

 is surrounded and jiearly covered by a great number of scales, lying over each other 

 like tiles. The blossoms, unlike those of most fruits, make no outward appearance, 

 -but are concealed within the fruit, on its internal surface. They are male and/emaie 

 — ^the former situated near the orifice, the latter in that part of the concavity near the 

 stalk. On cutting open a fig when it has attained little more than one-third its size, 

 the flowers will be seen in full development. In Asia and Southern Europe the 

 process of caprification is resorted to, which consists in placing the fruit of a wild 

 sort called the Capri fig or male fig among the cultivated ones. This is supposed to 

 to prevent the fruit from dropping prematurely, and to hasten its ripening by allow- 

 ing a, small gnat that infests the male fig to penetrate the cultivated ones. This pro- 

 ■cess is now pronounced useless by best authorities — I have grown many sorts, and 

 have yet to find one that does not set its fruit well, if the trees are not allowed to 

 suffer from severe drouth when the fruit is setting. 



Fig leaves are alternate, cordate, more or less deeply three to five-lobed, rough 

 and very ornamental. 



TjHE Fl© FOR NORTJHERN GULTURE. 



I claim that the Fig excels all other fruits for cultivation in the Northern States, 

 for the following reasons : 



I. The climate of the Middle and Northern States is one of the best possible 

 for the full development of the Fig, and as fine figs can be ^rown here in southern 

 Illinois as can be grown anywhere. Too great heat is not suitable for the Fig, caus- 

 ing the tree to shed its fruit. Our climate is not so dry, and the days are also sev- 

 -eral hours longer in the summer time than at the south, which gives a long .sunny 

 temperate day that precisely suits the Fig, and they therefore do grow and thrive' 

 wonderfully. Que cQuld not have found a single yellow, leaf on my hundreds of trees 

 the past summer. Our seasons, are long enough to thoroughly mature two crops 

 per year. 



