Plantwatch: Why fig trees are an emblem of Sheffield’s industrial past

Stock image of a fig tree. Sheffield’s trees grew into quite large specimens bearing fruit, and some are now thought to be more than 70 years old. Photograph: Jasenka Arbanas/Getty Images

On the banks of the River Don in Sheffield, within sight of the vast Meadowhall shopping centre, grow some highly exotic specimens – wild Mediterranean fig trees.

In the days of heavy industry, fig biscuits were a favourite local delicacy. After they were eaten, the fig seeds passed through people’s digestive systems and ended up discharged as sewage into streams and rivers. When Sheffield was the centre of a great steel-making industry on the banks of the Don, the factories used its water to cool the hot metal and then dumped the waste warm water back into the river.