The fig tree was dead. That much was certain.

It had eight or nine branches forking out from the main stem and every one of them was gray and dry. In other words, dead.

We first noticed it in March, but kept hoping for some kind of miracle as the calendar turned to April. Still, no sign of life. We have a soaker hose that runs among the blueberries, blackberries and fig tree, and we left it where it was and kept it going on its four-times-a-week schedule. By the time May rolled around, we resigned ourselves to the tree's demise.

We only had ourselves to blame. Our tree came from a cutting from my brother-in-law's fig tree in Valley Stream and it had lasted some 20-plus years. We had taken good care of it, diligently pruning and wrapping it each winter in successive layers of dead leaves, burlap, tar paper and plastic. But two years ago, inspired by a colleague who had left her tree unwrapped the previous winter yet still harvested a bevy of figs........

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