I got into fig (and since then, more broadly, fruit) cultivation. Figs have a rich history, lots of variety, and there are very active online (and in-person) communities where you can buy or exchange plants and cuttings, advice, and fruit. This grew out of an initial interest in gardening, and the long-term goal is to create a food/fruit forest around our house where me, family, friends, and neighbors can walk around, spend time, and eat the absolute best fruit possible.
So far I've got about 40 fig trees in containers (~30 varieties), am focusing a bit more on blackberries this year (4 varieties that were planted last year), and we also have strawberries, blueberries, raspberries, as well as a more standard annual garden with tomatoes, peppers, cucumbers, etc as well as some wild edibles: mulberries, wineberries, and black raspberries.
There's a lot of interesting angles to this hobby: fruit selection, cultivation, harvesting, pest management (annoying but still interesting), landscape design, etc. Planning cycles are months at a minimum, and but more often you have to keep in mind what you want the landscape and experience to be like years from now.
It makes it more enjoyable to spend time outside doing physical things when the weather is warm, and I mostly take a break from it (or switch to planning) during the winters here.
You've probably already discovered this, but in case you haven't: watch out for the black raspberries if they're in the ground. They spread at an astronomical rate and are practically unkillable after they're established.
We moved into this house partly bc it had an extra ~acre of space beyond the main "yard" which was starting to turn into a forest. We cleared it of woody stuff but left some black raspberries, maybe 10 plants?
2 years later, it turned into an impenetrable ~1/4 acre thicket of mostly black raspberries with some wild blackberries and wineberries among them. We paid to have it mostly cleared again, and now we are occasionally mowing whatever is not intentionally planted or mulched.
If you're in the right zone, give Pawpaws a chance! North America's largest native fruit! I've got about seven in and around my other trees (they're a forest understory tree) but haven't gotten fruit yet. Any year now...
I started cultivating dewberries and chokecherries because they're dying out near me. The chokecherries are good for like 2 weeks, otherwise they taste like soap.
Dewberries are a real bitch to get started and don't produce a ton of fruit, but are EASILY the best berries you'll ever eat in your life. The native variety are very tart compared to bred plants, but they're legitimately the best things that you can grow. If you have a spot where grass doesn't grow well, plant these!!
I have a volunteer fig tree growing in a container on my patio in the middle of a bunch of onions. I have always heard of people transplanting them from cuttings, presumably because they are difficult to grow from seed. I have no idea how it got there, but I feel fortunate to have been chosen.
Awesome! Curious to hear if it ripens good fruit for you.
In case it's interesting: people normally grow them from cuttings to make sure that the trees will 1. be female (males have figs, but they're not really edible), 2. hold/ripen fruit without pollination, 3. be true to type, and 4. bear fruit sooner (cuttings can bear fruit the first year under the right circumstances).
So far I've got about 40 fig trees in containers (~30 varieties), am focusing a bit more on blackberries this year (4 varieties that were planted last year), and we also have strawberries, blueberries, raspberries, as well as a more standard annual garden with tomatoes, peppers, cucumbers, etc as well as some wild edibles: mulberries, wineberries, and black raspberries.
There's a lot of interesting angles to this hobby: fruit selection, cultivation, harvesting, pest management (annoying but still interesting), landscape design, etc. Planning cycles are months at a minimum, and but more often you have to keep in mind what you want the landscape and experience to be like years from now.
It makes it more enjoyable to spend time outside doing physical things when the weather is warm, and I mostly take a break from it (or switch to planning) during the winters here.