Pictured is my fig-growing friend Joe. The frost has burned the leaves on most of his fig plants, but he's in his hoop-house picking the last figs of the season.
Mice and voles can be a challenge when overwintering in-ground figs are covered with mulch or are snug and warm in a tunnel. They love to eat the bark, which girdles the tree.
When I visited Joe one spring, a few of his plants had been girdled...
Not last winter! Joe told me that a family of weasels nested around his fig plants--and they took care of rodents.