Amateur hour: ficus edition
claire_elise_grady
6 years ago
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Jon
6 years agoDave
6 years agoRelated Discussions
What mixture to use for repotting a ficus elastica?
Comments (21)It's important to keep the roots hydrated during the repotting procedure. Allowing fine roots to dry for even a few minutes can kill them, so a tub/bucket to dip the roots in frequently, or a hand spritzer is the order of the day during repotting procedures ...... and now you know that repotting Ficus is better done in Jun or early Jul. This link will take you to lots of basic information about maintaining trees in containers over the long term. This one will help you understand the importance of soil choice to your ability to get all you can from the growing experience. This one discusses a sound nutritional supplementation program. If you haven't already read it, this one discusses how to maintain Ficus, specifically, in containers. Best luck. Al...See MoreFicus in a Pot - How to Prune to grow tall?
Comments (24)Yes, it's very easy, but you'll need to provide an image. As a bonsai practitioner, a regular part of how we make trees look very old is by inducing rapid taper in the trunk - very fat at the bottom, very thin on the top. Heavy branches low on the tree, twiggy growth at the top - just as you see in nature, only condensed. It's not unusual for me to dig up a tree which is 10 or more feet tall, immediately after shortening the tree to something like 4-6 inches in ht. At least 90% of my trees have had the 'trunk chop' procedure done multiple times. Examples: This ficus microcarpa ^^^ was chopped severely 3 times. You can barely see one major scar low on the right side of the tree. There's another between the leader and left branch, and another on the top of the right branch just to the right of the thinner part of the trunk. This tree ^^^ (having just been pruned hard in the image) has been chopped hard 5 times. In both cases, the chops are strategically planned so the scars aren't visible when observing the tree from its front, 'front' being it's best or most eye-appealing side. This ^^^ is the first (and second) chop on a maple (tree in middle - in black nursery can - big white scare. The branch with the wire is the new trunkline and the right fork (fatter side) of the trunk will eventually be cut off. It's purpose until that time is to add thickness to the thin part of the trunk. Same tree after several chops - notice the taper. The scars will heal. Same tree - still progressing. It has about 2 more years of growth and training before it gets a quality bonsai pot. This is last year's image, and it's made good progress this year. I hope you enjoyed that and were/are left with the sense it won't be too difficult to fix whatever you did to/for your tree. Trees are very predictable, so much so that we can plan ahead to utilize branches that don't yet exist, because we know at some point 'they will'. Ready when you are. Al...See MoreJust spent hours on Paul Barden's web site
Comments (81)"If my reward for that kindness is to have to deal with unscrupulous creeps who feel entitled to do as they please with my work, then something needs to change." But, it really is the bad percentage that we often react to, isn't it. I'm sure you've had a ton of profiteers stealing your work, but are they really the majority of people using your work? (and by using, I mean, visiting your site, reading your site, looking at your photos.) I would guess the majority, were people who -didn't- take your stuff, and just really enjoy your website. (How many hits does your site get and how many instances of copyright violation are there?) I can totally see how you'd get tired and frustrated from having to protect your copyright. Your site was one of the first that I found when I was looking for more information on Old Roses. (Google quite likes you as I'm sure you know.) And it's your choice. So please don't think I'm blaming you. But something doesn't necessarily "need to change". It has to change for you because that's where you're personal line of "enough is enough" is, but it's a choice. All the emails I've gotten over the years, and the friends I've made from being online and the unusual opportunities,... those to me outweigh my personal profiteers. Everyone has to make their own choices as to where that "worth it" line is. Like I said before, I have friends (who are artists) who don't post their work online for these reasons. campanula - I think if someone owns the copyright to something, it should not be stolen, according to the legal rules of copyright (whatever that is in each instance). I don't think that it's related to how famous or even how talented the owner of the copyright is. I don't really understand why we even have to argue the worth or how "professional" something is. If you create a work of art, you own the copyright. Even if it is hideous or amateurish. on the notion of taking photos of people's private gardens without permission. I must admit that over the past few months, when I drive by a house with a particularly beautiful garden, I stop and quickly take a photo. I've been saving these photos in a private folder on my computer. At one point, I'd thought about posting a thread sharing the photos so that other people could admire or be inspired by them, but then, I was also worried that perhaps by chance, one of the garden owners might see the thread and somehow be annoyed that I'd posted a photo of their garden without permission. So I haven't, and probably wont....See MoreFicus Lyrata Repot!!!
Comments (61)LB - full and partial defoliation is a somewhat advanced technique that is used for different purposes on plants that are very healthy. It can promote fullness and finer ramification (branch structure) by stimulating lots of adventitious back-budding that otherwise wouldn't occur if the plant was simply left to its own devices or if a normal pruning strategy was being employed. It is also very useful in restraining those branches that seem to garner the bulk of the tree's energy outlay, while at the same time forcing more energy to branches in distress because the tree might seem to be avoiding allocation of a fair share of energy to them, for which they suffer as they decline until they finally die and are shed. In short, it's a useful tool to help the grower balance/control the amount of energy that flows to the tree's various energy sinks. Read the first paragraph, or more if you like. Pruning branches back to 2 leaves and allowing 2 branches to grow from the axils of those 2 leaves and repeating the process over and over is the best way to promote fullness in your plant, but you must consider timing.If you did this every month of the year, the plant would soon die. The best strategy is to prune in June so you're removing winters leggy growth, then pinch all through the summer. Sometime in August, you stop pinching & allow the plant to grow unencumbered by pruning all winter long. When the summer solstice is nigh, prune again, follow your pinching routine, and repeat that cycle year after year. If you're repotting regularly and have some sense of what makes a tree pleasing to the eye, there is no reason your trees can't all be spectacular in just a few years. It's not at all difficult to master the basics, which ensures your ability to keep your plants viable & healthy; and learning the basic pruning steps isn't too difficult, either. I won't say a monkey could do it, but it doesn't require a rocket scientist, either. TLT - I'd cut the leaves in half on the top 1/3 of the tree ..... or you could try tenting the tree for a few days, but decide and act soon. The tree's response to drought includes the formation of an abscission layer at the base of wilting and drought stressed leaves where they are attached to the branch/stem. Once this layer has begun to form, it cannot be reversed. Regular scissors are fine, the sharper the better ("sharp" means less tissue crushed at the cut), and cut across the veins. Your leaves might regain turgidity, but several of the Ficus species (especially lyrata and elastica) are known for their inability to return to their same spatial positioning after wilting, and especially after severe wilting, so they might well have a permanent droopy attitude. Fertilize once normal growth has resumed. Wait until you're SURE it's pushing new growth before you fertilize. Fertilizer in the soil solution makes it harder for the plant to take up water - not a good thing immediately after a repot while root function is inhibited. We'll have more opportunities to talk about fat trunks, defoliation, and full canopies. I'm thinking it's better not to overwhelm you with a lot of new ideas that you might not fully understand. I think it would be helpful if you pick a thread about your favorite plant (or start one) and sort of flesh out any major plans a few days before you act on them for a while. Very often someone will learn about a technique new to them, get excited about it's potential benefits, and dive right in to it, learning only later that timing was off or a critical step was omitted. Usually, if you sort of give notice about what you intend to do for your plants on your next days off, you'll get some valuable and helpful input from those who've been there done that. It can save an unnecessary heartache. Enthusiasm is a beautiful thing, but unbridled enthusiasm can sometimes end up fostering eventualities that can dampen the spirit, even if temporarily. In case you can't tell, no one here wants to see that happen. We all want to share in your successes. Al...See Moreclaire_elise_grady
6 years agoDave
6 years agoJon
6 years agolast modified: 6 years agoDave
6 years agolast modified: 6 years agoclaire_elise_grady
6 years agoDave
6 years agolast modified: 6 years agoJon
6 years agoDave
6 years agolast modified: 6 years agoJon
6 years agolast modified: 6 years agoDave
6 years agolast modified: 6 years agoJon
6 years agoDave
6 years agolast modified: 6 years ago
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Jon