If you love your figs, you will love this news even more — one Queensland farmer has managed to trick his fruit into growing during winter.
Ash Emerick grows figs in a traditional orchard at Alloway, just outside Bundaberg, but he also uses polytunnels and a greenhouse to supply the market all year round.
What that means is that consumers can eat delicious Australian figs in winter, a time when they really should not be able to.
Summer is the traditional fig growing season although the fruit can be grown in cooler areas if the winter is moderate.
But generally, figs do not like frost, especially when trees are young.
"We have managed to manipulate the figs to trick them into growing during the winter," Mr Emerick said.
"We can control the climate in the greenhouse so they think it is summer."
How to trick figs
Mr Emerick said his greenhouse was the key to his success with almost everything automated, right down to the venting system on the roof and irrigation.
There is also heating for the figs growing in the greenhouse during the winter months.
A security team keeps a watchful eye over the operation.
"[The greenhouse] is all alarmed and monitored [so] if the water does not come on at the right time, we will get a phone call to say so," Mr Emerick said.
"It does get quite hot, quite fast, so without water in there for over an hour the plants do start to struggle."
Flexible marketing
In the safety of the greenhouse, the winter figs are almost near perfect in appearance, which means Mr Emerick can market them as a premium product.
"They are not exposed to the elements outside so the skin is not wind damaged [and] the size is more consistent so we can get a bit of a premium," he said.
The surety of supply also means the Bundaberg grower can be much more flexible with his marketing and sales.
"We actually market our summer and winter [fruit] under different names so during the winter, we market our figs as 'Forbidden'," Mr Emerick explained.
Room for expansion
Mr Emerick believes there is great potential in the fig industry which is also capable of expansion.
At this stage, there is no dedicated marketing body for the fruit but Mr Emerick said he had found the produce was making a name for itself all on its own.
"We do not have a problem getting rid of our fruit each day, which is good," he said.
"We have developed a name ourselves by supplying only premium quality fruit, so if the fruit is not up to scratch it does not go".
