Oh, please keep us updated. I've wanted one of these for a long time. Plant looks healthy, hope fully you have caught it in time. Don't know about this variety, but Ficus can get fussy about being moved around and will drop leaves to protest the changes.

I have quite a lot of experience with rescue plants so hopefully I can get it to bounce back. It doesn't look too far gone which is a plus. Also it couldn't have been in the store for more than a month which is also promising. I may lose the one braid but I'm not going to fret if I do.

Your braided Ficus alii looks happy and healthy. I bought one several years ago and I love it. It was in a pot just like that one at the time. I left it in there for quite a while and never encountered any problems. I eventually repotted it into a self-watering pot that holds some water, but keeps most of the plant above the reservoir. I water it normally from the top, letting the excess drain away, and then flush out the reservoir with clean water. Even with leaving some water in the bottom, my Ficus alii tends to soak it up fairly fast. It does seem to be getting somewhat top-heavy, but I don't think I'll repot it again just yet. I don't think that it's root bound, even though it does have quite a bit of them. I may hold off one more year before repotting it, moving it up to a bigger pot.

As for yours, I wouldn't even worry about drilling holes in the bottom. When you water it, just let the water drain away. After a few minutes of that, just tilt it over and let the excess drain away as well. Any remaining water will quickly get soaked up by your plant. Then, when spring finally rolls around, repot it as needed. These plants are just so beautiful and carefree.

I think it'll pull through. One of my ficus is an Alii. It's very easy to please. A little slower growing than my benjamina's though.

The more I look at it the more hopeful I am. It's only lost about 5-10 leaves since I brought it home and there seem to be more branches on the plant with the dead spot than I thought. I am still kind of curious about why the pot doesn't have drainage on the bottom. I can see a lot of bad things happening if a plant without drainage was bought by somebody who doesn't know a thing about how soils work. It also answers a lot of questions as to why I keep seeing ficus marked down only weeks after hitting the stores. I am on the lookout for a good pot for it. I'm not going to play with the roots but I feel like it has to be taken out of that pot asap regardless.

If you cut holes in the bottom, I'm sure it would be fine in that pot until June. That way you'd have more time to find something you like and you could also change out the soil to something a bit more fast draining.

I bet you'll have a ton of growth when you can stick it outside.

Hi Mentha!

Congrats on your ficus acquisition and sorry to hear you're disappointed in our pot. We call this a "high-hole pot" and we grow certain plants in these pots which are prone to loss from drying out because, as you found out, the pot acts like a little reservoir. In "average" retail conditions, this saves the lives of plants --- but in stores that do above-average watering, moisture can stay in the reservoir too long and cause issues.

Unfortunately, there's not a one-size-fits-all answer for scenarios like this. We're trying our best to give the largest number of plants as we can the longest-possible life in stores so you have a chance to adopt them.
:-)

---Justin, Costa Farms

Justin,

i understand your concept behind the holes being higher, but for the average person that might buy a ficus, if not promptly repotted, it'll likely be a death sentence.

I can understand that for a plant that really doesn't like drying out, but I'm sure a ficus would see more issues from having soggy feet as opposed to slightly dryer feet.

Hey Dave!

As a horticulturist, I understand your point (you are absolutely, 100 percent correct that in a home, too much water is worse than not enough), but as a grower, I also understand that few average people will have the opportunity to buy these plants if they dry out and die in the store before anyone has a chance to bring them home.

We've also found that most average homeowners repot larger plants like this into more attractive pots, so that reduces the risk of the high-hole pots causing problems once you bring them home.

But unfortunately, as part of the trade-off of keeping these plants alive in the stores, we know there may be some folks who don't repot their plants and can have troubles with these pots at home.

---Justin, Costa Farms

Makes sense.

Just curous of how you choose which have the higher holes and which don't? My now 6+ foot ficus benjamina was originally gown by you a couple years ago, and when I bought it (10" pot about 4' tall) it had a hole on the bottom and 4 holes on the bottom side, unlike the one pictured above.

Since alii and benjamina pretty much have the same watering requirements, how do you pick and choose which plant gets which pot?

All my plants at home are in drainage free pots and they are fine.

A Ficus Alii will cope better than most with being wet. Your plant will be fine.

Hey Dave: Great question, and one I don't happen to know the answer to. I'm looking into it, though, and will let you know what I hear back.

---Justin, Costa Farms

Stewartsjon,

I'm not sure I understand, you spoke in another post of "how you deliver ficus" and you spoke about how you have "customers."

yet you grow ficus in pots without drainage holes? You're never able to flush the soil and will untimely end up with a lot of salts and fertilizer accumulating in the soil that, in the end, will be the downfall for the tree.

Ficus alli will not cope with being wet. No ficus will in the long run.

please, if you're going to provide tips and info (especially to new comers, not including the OP) then please give good advice.

Thank you Justin!

Justin, That totally makes sense. I don't find ficus (besides the vining types) to be water hogs though. Maybe I should? Maybe we need to adjust how we tell people to care for their ficus as I've never noticed the high hole pots before and I definitely would not advise a newcomer to houseplants to leave their plant in the pot until summer for repot had I.

On a side note I was at HD yesterday and a lady was scanning an EA ZZ plant with her smart phone. Apparently she had a huge one and needed to know how to groom it. She was frustrated that she couldn't find any info on the plant by the scan so I told her a little about how I cared for mine. It pays being a plant nut.

EDIT: I just went into my living room and my floor was covered with leaves. All were half crispy and had large brown spots between the green and dry sections. Some are even a sickly yellow green. I also picked off about 30 or so off of the plant. I figured this was a possibility so I'm not really complaining right now, but photographic documentation might help somebody else identify problems they might have with their plants.

Some of them even folded in on themselves.

Even though those pots hold on to some water at the bottom, they still have those holes above that small amount of water. So the air supply to the roots isn't cut off, as it would be with a pot that had zero drainage holes whatsoever. And it still allows water to drain freely, preventing any salt or mineral buildup in the soil. As long as those roots have access to fresh air, they won't suffer from "overwatering." As you can see, these plants were grown in those pots in the nursery. They are used to the tips being in that small amount of water and grew just fine. It's not like they were just transferred to those pots before being shipped out to the stores. I would say that roughly 90% of its root mass is above that reservoir, taking in more than enough fresh air to maintain proper root functions. There is no need for concern from using these types of pots.

The first year that I had mine, it lost almost all of its leaves over the winter. But it grew many more news ones throughout spring, and fully recovered itself over the summer of the following year. Ficus alii is no stranger to shedding its leaves. Especially when being moved into a new environment. I still say that your plant is healthy, despite losing some of its leaves. I would, however, refrain from pruning any more bare branches. Having bare branches doesn't necessarily mean that those branches are dead. They will send out plenty of new leaves, given enough time. If any bare branches remain in the summertime, then feel free to prune those away as needed.

Like I said, I know it's the nature of the beast to lose leaves. I'm fine with that but it was the pot that had me confused. I'm not used to pots with holes on the sides unless they have orchids in them. And yes, the stems were dead. I've been growing plants long enough to know the difference between dead and dormant.

Hey Mentha: I'm not sure ficus are water hogs (that hasn't been my personal experience), but they did choose this one for the high-hole pot, so they're seeing some benefit from it.

Hey Dave: I haven't heard back from our growers yet (they spend more time out with the plants than they do on email), so I don't know why this ficus has the high holes and benjamina doesn't. I could speculate (it could be that we're just switching over, it could be that they're only testing this, etc.), but I don't have a real answer at this point.

---Justin, Costa Farms

Thank you Justin for your patience and time. I appreciate it. For the time being I'll have to experiment with the pot or just slip it out and put it in a normal nursery pot.

Dave

I work for a commercial interior landscaping company, and have done for 18 years.

All our plants are in sealed pots (albeit with drainage medium in the base). Office workers don't seem to like planters with holes in stuck next to their desks for some reason. Ultimately plants would be better with drainage, but of all things Ficuses can cope - we have 6ft plus Ficus Aliis in pots no bigger than 18" across that are over a decade old, so they seem to be coping.

And Ficuses don't like being wet? Big ones drink like pissed fish!

This is a forum. People have different opinions. Some of them are frankly over-complicated nonsense, but I let it go.