Bountiful Figs

'BryantDark' ('Dark Berry, Fruity Berry' flavor fig)

Each of it's fruits has a very tight eye, which stays very tight until each of it's fruits starts the last stage of ripening. Yet the eyes of it's fruits don't open enough for insects to get in, even the "over ripe" figs. Although wasps, birds and other creatures can make holes in it's fruits! It's fruit is very rain, very split and very moisture resistant. It's fruit does not get watered down easily.

The ripe, soft but firm fruit of 'BryantDark' has a rich thick sweet jammy raspberry/ripe peach/ripe apricot like flavor, it's small to large sized fruit is juicy, is sweet to very sweet 'with a slight tang', yet it is not as sweet as the fruit of 'Celeste'. It's fruit has a great balance of sweet/acid. It's breba figs have the same taste as it's main crop figs. The flesh of it's fruit is amber with a strawberry colored pulp 'when fully ripe'. It's fruit has little seed crunch, those seeds are said to be nutty, and are said to be 'small seeds'. The taste of it's fruit appears to to be like 'Hardy Chicago', without the complexity of the flavor found in the fruit of 'Hardy Chicago'.

This cultivar has high production. 'BryantDark' is an early season cultivar. This cultivar's 'breba crop' begins to ripen 'mid to late July', it's 'main crop' starts ripening about 1 month later, in about August, and continues ripening until frost hits.

The thin tender skin of it's fruit is usually a 'dark burgundy' color in warm/hot summers with plenty of sunlight, sometimes almost black, the color of it's fruit is paler at the neck, when it's figs are ripening in cooler weather, or with little sunlight hours their skin will have stripes, and might be reddish, or a light burgundy!

Most of the figs that 'BryantDark' produces stays on the tree, they do not drop or shake loose, very few of it's figs ever fall to the ground, and so they have to be 'picked' manually. It's figs dry on the tree if you let them, and if insects, if birds, if rodents, and if other wildlife don't get them.

If the figs of this cultivar are left out at room temperature indoors, for 1 to 2 days after picking, it's berry flavor increases, that flavor becomes more concentrated! This appears to be common with the fig cultivars that dry easily on the tree.

It's dark spinach-green leaves, they look fuzzy/hairy, they look thick and leathery. It's leaves are mostly 5 lobed, or 5 lobed with thumbs, very few of it's leaves are 3 lobed. It's leaves are usually similar to the shape of the leaves that 'Hardy Chicago' has. The leaves of 'Bryant Dark' get large, it's leaves showing zero symptoms of 'Fig Mosaic Virus'. This cultivar is healthy, and it's vegetation grows like a weed.

'ascpete' of the former Figs4Fun forum (Pete) said that this cultivar has existed 'where he found it' since 1977. He 'discovered' it growing in a 'previously ethnic Italian neighborhood', in a yard 'located in Bronx, NY'. This cultivar was originally grown by an 'Italian American gentleman', the tree later had a new owner, an old family friend of Pete's named 'Mrs Bryant'. The history of this cultivar pre-1977 is not known.

The arctic vortex of January - March 2014 caused lots of damage to the original unprotected 'BryantDark', yet it survived that years' arctic vortex, and it's comeback was already obvious May 20th 2014, when the first leaves popped out! That was much sooner in the year than when other fig trees in NYC showed life again 'that year'!