What Are Those Crunchy Things In My Fig?

Thanks to Rowan Jacobsen for shedding some light on the subject of rainforest figs in one of the chapters of his book “Fruitless Fall”.  The book is about the collapse of the honey bee and the coming agricultural crisis. He mentioned figs in chapter 11, and it was really interesting. I wanted to share some of what I learned from him and also a small amount of what I added from the internet.

 Rainforest Figs, Grown From The Top Down.

 It seems that there are thousands of species of figs on the earth. All of which, unless cultivated by humans, grow in the rainforests of the world.  It’s amazing to me just how much correlation there is between insects and food. Much more than I had ever thought, and am learning as I read different books about foods and climate control, and the way we harvest and use our only food supply. In the rainforest figs grow and multiply greatly without any help from us and is sustaining monkeys, bats, insects, and birds.  Who otherwise would die. 

Fig trees pretty much get their start from the top and work their way down. As I read this I really had no idea what they were talking about. It seems that the monkeys, bats, birds and others that eat these fruits are living and climbing to the canopies of the rainforest, and their droppings which hold the tiny seeds are dropped onto the canopy leaves in the rainforest.  The seeds sprout hair like shoots that grow to the ground while spiraling the host tree. In reaching the truck it has grown leaves and branches so thick that it has strangled the host tree. The main host dies and the shoots bury themselves into the ground and get nutrients from around the base of the tree. These new shoots now will live for centuries. Creating new figs several times a year.

 How Is A Fig Ripened? Fig Wasps.

 Female Fig Wasps ready to lay eggs find themselves an unripened virgin fig. This fig will have an eyehole ready and waiting for the female to enter leading to the center. She enters the small eyehole possibly losing her wings and or antennae. Once inside she has scraped the entrance with her body which also has pollen.  She finds the center and without going into detail finds the right spot to lay her eggs. Once she has laid her eggs she dies and the fleshy fruit consumes her corpse. She now is part of the fruit.

A few weeks later the male eggs hatch first. They are ready to fertilize the non-hatched females by chewing a hole in her outer egg side and inseminating them. The males then go to the eyehole which has closed off with the ongoing ripening of the fig. They chew a tunnel for the female to escape through. Once this is done they head back to the center of the fig and die. The male corpse of these pupas become consumed and also become part of the fruit. The females are ready to hatch. They are ready to lay their eggs and ready to leave the fig. On their way out through the eyehole they too are scraping the sides and are receiving more pollen to take with them as they go off into the world looking for their own unripened fig to lay their eggs in. The cycle starts all over again.

 So What Are Those Crunchy Things Inside My Fig?

 I told you all about the rainforest fig to tell you that the crunchy things inside your figs are nothing but seeds.  Here in the USA, we cultivate our figs. They too are wasp pollinated. I’m told only the Calimyrnas Figs are, but I also read that most of the figs we eat in the USA are some sort of Calimyrnas fig.  The Calimyrnas fig is a whole different post. So does eating a decayed wasp bother you? 

Bothers me … and the one I am eating now is delicious.