To All,
As I ate my first fig, I was prepared to compare its taste to that of a Fig Newton since that would be the only reference point for most of my readers, In fact, there was no taste at all. I worked my way through six figs and found not the slightest taste. The texture was not off-putting but was nothing special. In short, I ate five bucks worth of figs in three minutes and got no pleasure from it.
(Continued in Part 2)
To my surprise, Stop&Shop had for sale a half-pound package of figs for $4.99. This means that, on a per pound basis, figs tie rambutan (21 Sep 2014) for the most expensive fruit I have encountered.
Figs do not play a prominent role in American life. Other than Fig Newtons and the phrase "flying fig," the average Americans rarely come in contact with them. Figs were not even mentioned in "Ahab the Arab."
The Plant
The figs are in the genus Ficus in the family Moraceae, the mulberry family. Remember that this family also has given us jack fruit (4 Aug 2014) and breadfruit (9 May 2015). There are many different types of figs; the common fig, which we eat, is Ficus carica.
The fig tree is usually between 20 and 35 feet tall. It grows in dry, sunny areas, and it tolerates seasonal droughts well. Below are pictures of the tree.
While fig trees are not well known to most Americans, they are famous among botanists because of their absurdly complicated pollination strategy. In fact, explaining how this pollination occurs is one of the great set pieces of pollination biology. Here is the essence. For starters, the fig flowers are not open to view but are hidden inside little green spheres (see pictures below), which are about a quarter of an inch in diameter. By "flowers" is meant not the showy petals that we usually think of as flowers but rather the essential parts of flowers, namely the male part that supplies the pollen and the female part that accepts the pollen. The unusual feature is that wind and standard pollinators can't effect pollination since the flowers are hidden inside the little green spheres. Something unusual is needed, and here is where the bizarre life cycle of the fig wasps becomes relevant.
- A mature female fig wasp enters one of the little green spheres. In doing so, she loses her wings and antenna since the passageway is so tight.
- Some of the little green spheres contain only female flowers, and some, called caprifigs, contain only male flowers. The female wasp can't tell the difference; she apparently enters one at random.
- If she enters a female sphere, she brushes against the female parts as she squeezes in and deposits on them some of the pollen on her body; to see where this pollen comes from, keep reading. Then she dies.This female fig develops into the fruit that we eat, and it contains seeds. (This is how the fig gets pollinated and produces seeds, but it's a dead end for the wasp.) See the picture of the fruit below; the ripe fig has grown and turned a purplish color.
- If she enter a male sphere, i.e., a caprifig:
- She lays eggs, both male and female, and dies. (The caprifigs do not produce seeds and are inedible; the female figs are the ones we eat.)
- The male wasps hatch first. These are degenerate wasps that lack wings and other wasp parts; they look a lot like worms. They crawl over to the eggs that contain female wasps and mate with them, so the female wasps are pregnant even before they hatch. The male wasps die. The female wasps hatch and exit the caprifig. This is how the wasps are propagated.
- As the female wasps leave the caprifig, they brush against the plant's male parts that contain pollen, and some of the pollen clings to their bodies. Therefore, they are transporting pollen on their bodies after they have left; this answers the question left open above of how the pollen gets on the bodies of the female wasps.
- A female wasp then flies to and enters another little green capsule, and we are back at step 1. (By this I mean the first of the three step 1s. G-mail's auto-numbering feature is gravely flawed.) The cycle of life continues.
This explains how both the figs and the wasps propagate. To improve your understanding, I urge you to watch the video here (3 minutes) or here (4 minutes), which do a good job illustrating and explaining fig pollination. Be aware that there are about 755 species of figs and about 640 known species of fig wasps with, it is estimated, between 1300 and 2600 fig wasps still to be described. Figs and fig wasps have co-evolved; which means that they have evolved together and that they have cooperatively evolved this convoluted pollination scheme. Figs are only pollinated by fig wasps,and fig wasps can breed only in figs, so neither can survive without the other; this is called obligate mutualism. The precise series of steps differs among the different fig species; in my explanation, I have followed the second video. If you want to learn more about figs, fig wasps, and all things fig, Figweb is the authoritative site.
Another video tackles the question of why figs sometimes burn your mouth and tongue. The narrator picks a fig from a tree, and latex oozes from the wound. (Latex is a white, milky material; think jack fruit, milkweed, and dandelion.) This latex, which is an enzyme that dissolves protein, is the plant's natural defense against predators, and it ensures that they don't eat under-ripe figs. (This is another example of the way that plants manipulate animals, previously discussed in "The Ecology of Sweet and Sour" in the e-mail of 12 June 2015.) Once the fig ripens on the tree, the latex goes away. The problem is that commercially grown figs are picked before they are ripe, so there is often latex present in the figs that you buy in stores. It is this latex that can produce a burning sensation. Also, traditional healers use this latex to remove warts and corns. As the explanation of the fig wasp life cycle above points out, dead wasp bodies are left inside the figs; the latex, in addition to repelling herbivores, also breaks down the dead wasp bodies into healthful protein, so the wasp carcasses become part of the fruit and present no hazard to humans.
Once the figs are ripe and no longer harbor latex, they are often an important food for birds and other animals, and figs are propagated when these animals disperse its seeds after eating the fruit.
Figs can also be propagated by cuttings. An alternate way is to bend a branch over until it touches the ground, tie it in that position, scratch it where it touches the ground to expose the inner bark, let time pass so that it takes root where it touches the ground, cut the bent branch, and you have an independent fig plant.
A notable feature of the fig tree is that its taproot can go deep, force its way through cracks in rocks, and otherwise search relentlessly for water; this is what makes it drought-resistant. This root brings up water and tends to cool the micro-climate in the vicinity of the fig tree, and animals like to relax in its shade. This aggressive root, however, makes the fig an unsuitable tree in an urban setting since it buckles sidewalks and otherwise interferes with structures.
There is evidence that figs were grown by humans in the period 9400-9200 B.C. It is possible that figs were domesticated prior to wheat, barley, and beans, and were, in fact, the very first plant that was domesticated.
The ancient Romans liked to feed figs to geese in the production of a primitive foie gras.
Tasting Figs
The pictures below document my showdown with the figs.
- The seven figs purchased.
- A close up of a fig showing its stem.
- Another close-up after I have yanked out the stem. Not only is the stem hard and inedible, but it is likely to harbor latex. Always remove the stem before eating.
- A fig cut in half. I cut all my figs in two before eating them. For my first fig, I scooped the meat out of one of the halves with a spoon since the peel, though edible, sometimes has latex. Dropping my fear of latex, I popped the other half, including peel, into my mouth. Nothing bad happened, so I ate five more figs, peel and all. I threw one of my figs away since it was over-ripe.
- The remains of my fig feast. You see the one hollowed half and the six stems.
The verdict: Since I could detect no taste, there seems to be no reason to eat this fabulously expensive fruit. (I suspect that I got some especially bland figs. I will be watching for another source and will give them a second chance. Also, I should mention that I bought and ate these figs last fall. This e-mail got lost in the shuffle and was delayed.)
Figs in the Bible
While fig trees are not familiar to Americans, they are familiar in the Middle East and figure prominently as teaching tools in the New Testament, e.g., the parable of the barren fig tree in Luke 13:6-9, in which a three year-old fig tree that is not producing is given a one-year reprieve before being cut down. Not being an expert on symbolism, I don't get the point of this parable, but you can find an interpretation at this site. In addition, the parable of the budding fig tree appears in much the same form in Matthew 24:32-35, Mark 18:28-31, and Luke 21:29-33; its content is that when you see buds on the tree, then you know that summer is near. I couldn't understand this parable either, but for a couple of interpretations, see this site. One thing I do understand is why Adam and Eve used fig leaves to cover their nakedness in Genesis 3:7; it's because fig leaves are extraordinarily big and, therefore, cover a lot. This also explains why artists make wide use of fig leaves; see the statue of Mercury below. Go to this site for a list of 43 Bible verses that mention figs.
It seems to me that a fig tree is treated unfairly in Mark 11:12-14, when Jesus and the disciples were out for a walk.
The next day as they were leaving Bethany, Jesus was hungry. Seeing in the distance a fig tree in leaf, he went to find out if it had any fruit. When he reached it, he found nothing but leaves, because it was not the season for figs. Then he said to the tree, "May no one ever eat fruit from you again." (New Revised Standard Version, quoted in Wikipedia)
The next day, verse 20 reports that the fig tree had withered to the roots. It seems to me that Jesus, who is supposed to be a model of restraint, was being intemperate in cursing a fig tree for not having figs even though it was not fig season. I guess this fig tree put Jesus into a bad mood since verses 15-19 record how, after leaving it, he spent the rest of the day flying into a rage and casting the money changers and pigeon dealers from the temple.
It turns out that when the Bible refers to the sycomore tree, it does not mean the sycamore tree that we are familiar with, which has mottled bark and a spiky, ball-like fruit; see the pictures below of the sycamore tree in front of the house next door to Mike and its fruit. (You can see my white Toyota in the background; you last saw it surrounded by snow in the e-mail of 27 Mar 2015.) Rather, the Bible is referring to the sycomore fig, Ficus sycomorus (Note that the sycomore fig is spelled with a "o" in the second syllable to distinguish it from the sycamore. The King James Version and the New English Bible both use "sycomore.") In the familiar verse Luke 19:4, the rich publican Zaccheus climbs up into a sycomore tree, i.e., a fig tree, so he can see Jesus. This verse is often the text for Southern Baptist sermons since the image of a rich guy climbing a tree appeals to everyone. Southern Baptist preachers, however, do not carefully distinguish between the sycamore and the sycomore. They should since fig trees, with low-lying branches, as shown in the pictures above, are easy to climb, whereas sycamore trees, which lack such branches, as shown the picture below, are hard to climb. The Bible story doesn't make sense if the sycamore tree is your mental image.
