Description:
Common fig (Ficus carica)
Ficus carica is a monoecious, deciduous tree or a large shrub. It is native to the Middle East. It was later cultivated from Afghanistan to Portugal, and from the 15th century onwards, was grown in areas including Northern Europe and the New World. In the 16th century, Cardinal Reginald Pole introduced fig trees to Lambeth Palace in London. Like the mulberry tree, it has a substance called “latex,” which is extracted for industrial purposes in the related Ficus elastica. It grows to a height of 6.9–10 metres (23–33 ft) tall, with smooth grey bark. Ficus carica is well known for its fragrant leaves that are large and lobed.
The leaves are 12–25 centimetres (4.7–9.8 in) long and 10–18 centimetres (3.9–7.1 in) across, and deeply lobed with three or five lobes. Ficus carica have pyriform Sicon infructescences, the fleshy fruit fig, with inner unisexual flowers. The fruit is 3–5 centimetres (1.2–2.0 in) long, with a green skin, sometimes ripening towards purple or brown. Ficus carica has milky sap (laticifer). The sap of the fig’s green parts is an irritant to human skin.
Ecology:
The Common fig tree has been cultivated since ancient times and grow wild in dry and sunny areas, with deep and fresh soil; also in rocky areas, from sea level to 1,700 meters. It prefers light and medium soils, requires well-drained soil, and can grow in nutritionally-poor soil. Like all fig trees, Ficus carica requires wasp pollination of a particular species of wasp to produce seeds. The plant can tolerate seasonal drought, and the Middle Eastern and Mediterranean climate is especially suitable for the plant. Situated in a favorable habitat, old specimens when mature can reach a considerable size and form a large dense shade tree.
Its aggressive root system precludes its use in many urban areas of cities, but in nature helps the plant to take root in the most inhospitable areas. Common fig tree is mostly a phreatophyte that live in areas with standing or running water, grows well in the valleys of the rivers and ravines saving no water, having strong need of water that extracted from the ground. The deep-rooted plant search groundwater, in aquifers, ravines, or cracks in the rocks. The fig tree, with the water, cools the environment in hot places, creating a fresh and pleasant habitat for many animals that take shelter in its shade in the times of intense heat.
Common fig (Ficus carica) Distribution in North America shown in green.
The flower is not visible, as it blooms inside the infructescence. Although commonly referred to as a fruit, the fig is actually the infructescence or sicon of the tree, known as a false fruit or multiple fruit, in which the flowers and seeds are borne. It is a hollow-ended stem containing many
flowers. The small orifice (ostiole) visible on the middle of the fruit is a narrow passage, which allows to the specialized fig wasp, to enter the fruit and pollinate the flower, whereafter the fruit grows seeds. Ficus carica is dispersed by birds and mammals that scatter their seeds in droppings. It is an important food source for much of the fauna in some areas, and it owes its expansion. The common fig tree also sprouts from the root and
Close up of Common fig (Ficus carica)
stolon issues. The genus Dorstenia, which, like the fig, is in the mulberry family (Moraceae), exhibits similar tiny flowers arranged on a receptacle but in this case the receptacle is a more or less flat, open surface. It is a structure intermediate between the fig and the mulberry, where the fig corresponds in structure to an invaginated or inside-out mulberry.
The infrutescence is pollinated by a symbiosis with a kind of fig wasp. The fertilized female wasp enters the fig through the sicon, which is a tiny hole in the crown (the ostiole). She crawls on the inflorescence inside the fig and pollinates some of the female flowers. She lays her eggs inside some of the flowers and dies. After weeks of development in their galls, the male wasps emerge before females through holes they produce by chewing the galls. The male wasps then fertilize the females by depositing semen in the hole in the gall. The males later return to the females and enlarge the holes to facilitate the females to emerge. Then some males enlarge holes in the scion, which enables females to disperse after collecting pollen from the developed male flowers. Females have a short time (<48 hours) to find another fig tree with receptive siconios to spread the pollen and assist the tree in reproduction.
