I grow both of these but up North in Ontrio with relatively shorter season for fig growing.
My Peter Honey ripens earlier than Panachi which is known to be a relatively late rippening kind. But you have warm (hot) summer and long season so both should work out fine for you as long as you keep them happy with watering schedule in Arizona.

Hi az_pamperedchef

Your trees look GREAT. But they need a little more protection their first year.

I live a couple hours to the north of you, but even up here, in my experience, a heavily mulched (as in 4-6 inches deep), and a WIDE protected root zone (as in...at least 18 inches out from the base of the tree...preferably more) go a long way towards combating the high temps we are about to experience.

Extending the radius of your planting circles will not only help you keep those roots moist (which you must do their first summer here), but will also keep them from baking when the soil starts to heat up.

Best of luck with them.

I have a Panache and a VdB fig planted in my yard in Tucson, very close to the same climate. I planted both in ground as 5 gallon nursery plants back in October and they made it through the winter with no protection and no damage. They've been growing well since breaking dormancy in March. I notice that they have a tendency to curl leaves up after the sun has been on them for a few hours. They uncurl as soon as they go into shade, which happens in the mid-afternoon where they are planted. The VdB curls its leaves much more than the Panache. It seems like they aren't really full sun plants here in the desert, at least when first starting out. I have them mulched to about 6' diameter and they are on drippers that soak them every other day. Seems like they would like to be watered a bit more often, but they share the dripper loop with citrus, which is fine with that schedule. I don't know what to do about the water timing differences.

I'm thinking about experimenting with application of "Surround crop protectant" and/or "Anti-stress 2000". Surround is a white reflective substance useful for partial protection against too much sun. Anti-stress 2000 is an acrylic anti-transpirant that limits water loss through leaves. I have a little bit of both products on hand. I'm curious if either one would help the young fig trees with their first summer blast here. Or it might be smarter to just leave them alone, but there isn't as much fun in that.

Thank you Centurion & Bada Bing for your comments. I do have the mulch pretty deep, it's about 4" deep. When I first planted the trees in February, the Panache would have droopy leaves in the morning. I hand watered it for a week or so and that stopped. I am keeping a close eye on them. Peter's Honey is actually doing better than the Panache in my opinion. It has set more figs. Don't know if that's a good indicator, but it works for me!

An update on my "new" figs: the Panache is all filled out with leaves, but don't see any figlets. I know I'm probably jumping the gun a bit, but I'm excited.

Peter's Honey is more slowly growing. Not as many leaves and the leaves look a little limp. They don't feel limp, but look it.

Last year I only got one Panache fig and no Peter's Honey, hopefully this year will be a better year!