If you are squeamish and like figs, this may comfort you.
According to a comment in the original post, majority of commercial ones do not contain insects:
"Only some kinds of figs (so called 'Smyrna' types) are pollenated by wasps. The vast majority of figs eaten come from varieties that produce fruit parthenocarpically. It is highly unlikely that the fig you ate at the supermarket was of a variety pollenated by wasps: most north american commercial figs are not."
Essentially a mutation that gets trees to produce useless fruits that don't have actually developed seeds and don't need pollination. While that sort of mutation would normally be selected against, since the trees can't reproduce via seeds and are expending energy on producing fruit for no reason, it's deliberately selected for by farmers who artificially reproduce the trees via planting cuttings, or grafting them onto rootstock.
(Though I guess really the "naturally" versus "artificially" distinction is a bit, erm, artificial, if you just think of humans as another species, since lots of natural selection is influenced by relationships between species, like the wasp-fig relationship in this article. So trees evolving to please humans isn't really different in kind from trees evolving to work well with wasps.)
Most of the commercial figs grown in California are wasp pollinated. If a fig is crunchy, it contains seeds, and if it contains seeds, the flowers inside it were likely pollinated by at least one wasp.
They are correct. Most of the figs, at least the fresh ones you would buy in the US, are parthenocarpic. Dried figs, or what might be in a fig newton, well... you're on your own on that one.
There is an amazing amount of wildlife in a wasp pollinated fig. If you break one open, all sorts of interesting stuff crawls out, not just immature wasps, but also a lot of organisms that prey on the wasps.
Ripe figs are delicious, and knowing that they've also, potentially killed a wasp - man's greatest enemy - only makes their nectar sweeter to my tongue.
The knowledge of enclosed vespine corpses just adds one more item to my growing list of things I hate about fig trees, of which I have two. Two fig trees are at least one and probably two fig trees too many. Too much pruning is required because spring growth is extensive. Too much fall raking is required because there's a ton of foliage too. But the real pain in the ass is harvesting. Figs really have to ripen on the tree, but as soon as they're ripe they're liable to fall. Without daily vigilance, a big crop will result in lots of smashed, rotting fruit on the ground, which sticks with insane determination to the soles of unwary shoes. Naturally in the season of maturation the fig tree is also the haunt of 17.6 billion insects of every variety, so while it provides ample shade from the sun, it's better to just suck it up and burn. Also less than the most satisfying experience of one's life is picking figs from the tree with a view to either engaging in the messy and overrated process of eating them, the laborious and not especially rewarding process of drying them, or merely in the pathetically futile effort to protect the ground beneath. Mucking about in the middle of that foliage is massively irritating to any exposed skin because of the sticky residue that seems to find its disgusting way onto every leaf and branch. The severity of this irritation is such that extraordinary caution is recommended before following the presumably divinely-inspired path towards modesty followed by Adam and Eve.
If we were being poetic, here, then I'd say that Man's greatest enemy is Man themselves, but this is HN, so I won't. For a runner up, I would at least choose an animal that can actually kill a healthy human, rather than one that and annoy a healthy human and kill a subset with allergic reactions of venom.
2.) There are a lot of species of wasp. According to wikipedia, 160,000. Not all of them will sting, or even can sting humans. Fig wasps count among them. There are quite a few wasps that are beneficial, in that they predate upon insects that are slightly more annoying than the wasps themselves.
3.) Nectar is produced (generally) by flowers, to attract pollinators. By design, it's easily accessible by insects, and not protected by the rind of a fruit. The juice of a fruit is just juice, not nectar.
You forgot to first make a small lengthwise cut in the fig, and fill it with blue cheese. Then wrap it with bacon, secure with a toothpick, and put it on the bbq.
The concluding chapter of Dawkins's _Climbing Mount Improbable_ is all about this, and it needed a whole chapter because it's mind-blowingly intricate.
If you move into a house (purchase/rent/otherwise) with a fig tree and plan to relandscape. Be very careful. Fig tree roots run very shallow, and even older trees are susceptible to damage to the roots.
I found out the hard way - rototilling an overgrown back yard due to too much grass, weeds, bulbs, etc. The 'till chomped through two or three large surface roots (< 8" deep which were more than 4 feet from the tree). The result - one dead 20+ y/o fig tree.
At first glace it seemed like this species of wasp was inbreeding. But after reading a Wiki article [1], it seems like different female wasps can lay eggs in a single fig.
They do inbreed very heavily--not exclusively, but more than any other animal of which I'm aware. The larva will mate with siblings, if that's who they happen to find.
We got figs in at a restaurant I cook at this past week. We have fig ravioli on our seared scallop app (with frisse, radiccio, butternut puree, and reduced port), a fresh fig salad with fig vin (and mesclun, candied pinenuts, fried onions, and goat cheese mousse), and bruleed figs on our whipped chocolate dessert (with mint sorbet). Fun product, and, for us anyway, insect free.
Fascinating. Here is a video showing the wasps collecting the pollen inside a male fig flower (as described in the first paragraph): http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yZCYoEdavDk
The man came in the restaurant, pointed to a meal looking like meat and asked: "What it that?" The attentand replied: "that's our special: cow tongue!" And the man said: "Argh, I won't eat something that comes from the mouth of that animal... Just give me an egg, please."
the more you know about where your food comes from, the better. maybe you wouldn't eat that burger if you knew the pesticides, hormones and antibiotics that go into it. maybe you wouldn't eat that shellfish which may be full of birth control hormones. and maybe you wouldn't eat that genetically modified corn. in the bigger picture, eating a dead wasp seems like the healthy choice.
[+] [-] bd|15 years ago|reply
According to a comment in the original post, majority of commercial ones do not contain insects:
"Only some kinds of figs (so called 'Smyrna' types) are pollenated by wasps. The vast majority of figs eaten come from varieties that produce fruit parthenocarpically. It is highly unlikely that the fig you ate at the supermarket was of a variety pollenated by wasps: most north american commercial figs are not."
http://scienceblogs.com/oscillator/2010/09/edible_symbiosis....
I chose to believe this explanation :)
[+] [-] _delirium|15 years ago|reply
Essentially a mutation that gets trees to produce useless fruits that don't have actually developed seeds and don't need pollination. While that sort of mutation would normally be selected against, since the trees can't reproduce via seeds and are expending energy on producing fruit for no reason, it's deliberately selected for by farmers who artificially reproduce the trees via planting cuttings, or grafting them onto rootstock.
(Though I guess really the "naturally" versus "artificially" distinction is a bit, erm, artificial, if you just think of humans as another species, since lots of natural selection is influenced by relationships between species, like the wasp-fig relationship in this article. So trees evolving to please humans isn't really different in kind from trees evolving to work well with wasps.)
[+] [-] larsr|15 years ago|reply
Here is a great article with more details :)
http://waynesword.palomar.edu/pljune99.htm
[+] [-] whyenot|15 years ago|reply
There is an amazing amount of wildlife in a wasp pollinated fig. If you break one open, all sorts of interesting stuff crawls out, not just immature wasps, but also a lot of organisms that prey on the wasps.
[+] [-] latch|15 years ago|reply
[+] [-] pigbucket|15 years ago|reply
[+] [-] sbierwagen|15 years ago|reply
1.) Wasps as man's greatest enemy? Really?
If we were being poetic, here, then I'd say that Man's greatest enemy is Man themselves, but this is HN, so I won't. For a runner up, I would at least choose an animal that can actually kill a healthy human, rather than one that and annoy a healthy human and kill a subset with allergic reactions of venom.
2.) There are a lot of species of wasp. According to wikipedia, 160,000. Not all of them will sting, or even can sting humans. Fig wasps count among them. There are quite a few wasps that are beneficial, in that they predate upon insects that are slightly more annoying than the wasps themselves.
3.) Nectar is produced (generally) by flowers, to attract pollinators. By design, it's easily accessible by insects, and not protected by the rind of a fruit. The juice of a fruit is just juice, not nectar.
[+] [-] gus_massa|15 years ago|reply
It is better to link to the original article. It has some photos and videos of the figs.
[+] [-] jacobolus|15 years ago|reply
[1]: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Common_Fig#Pollination.2C_fruit...
[2]: http://scienceblogs.com/observations/2010/01/even-mutualists...
[+] [-] kujawa|15 years ago|reply
Okay, take about 8 of them.
And take 8 strips of thick-cut, maple-smoked, peppered organic bacon, the best you can find.
Wrap the fig in the bacon, secure with a toothpick, and place on a pan.
Roast at 425F for about 25 minutes, checking after about 15 minutes.
I assure you, you will not be disappointed.
[+] [-] alexqgb|15 years ago|reply
[+] [-] cvg|15 years ago|reply
[+] [-] dboyd|15 years ago|reply
[+] [-] RickHull|15 years ago|reply
[+] [-] peterwwillis|15 years ago|reply
[+] [-] abecedarius|15 years ago|reply
http://books.google.com/books?id=erRC0ELnZdsC&pg=PA300&#...
[+] [-] jmspring|15 years ago|reply
If you move into a house (purchase/rent/otherwise) with a fig tree and plan to relandscape. Be very careful. Fig tree roots run very shallow, and even older trees are susceptible to damage to the roots.
I found out the hard way - rototilling an overgrown back yard due to too much grass, weeds, bulbs, etc. The 'till chomped through two or three large surface roots (< 8" deep which were more than 4 feet from the tree). The result - one dead 20+ y/o fig tree.
Be careful when gardening/redoing a yard.
[+] [-] TrevorBramble|15 years ago|reply
(Re: http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1685161 if you hadn't seen.)
[+] [-] frobozz|15 years ago|reply
[+] [-] superkarn|15 years ago|reply
[1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fig_wasp#Life_cycle
[+] [-] Pinckney|15 years ago|reply
[+] [-] jcromartie|15 years ago|reply
[+] [-] maxwell|15 years ago|reply
[+] [-] dunhamda|15 years ago|reply
[+] [-] Figs|15 years ago|reply
[+] [-] hernan7|15 years ago|reply
[+] [-] lostbit|15 years ago|reply
[+] [-] hdeshev|15 years ago|reply
[+] [-] duairc|15 years ago|reply
I don't think this makes figs unvegan though. At least, eating figs is just as vegan as building a house out of limestone.
[+] [-] arohner|15 years ago|reply
[+] [-] nollidge|15 years ago|reply
[+] [-] grantjgordon|15 years ago|reply
[+] [-] ssamuli|15 years ago|reply
[+] [-] bugsy|15 years ago|reply
[+] [-] sliverstorm|15 years ago|reply
[+] [-] geuis|15 years ago|reply
[+] [-] peterwwillis|15 years ago|reply
[+] [-] Emore|15 years ago|reply
[+] [-] d_c|15 years ago|reply
My, they sure are delicious fruits.