"The man that I'm involved with has had 3 failed marriages and done time for drug dealing" Well at least it sounds like you are getting what you deserve. "...since he's found me he's been given a new lease of life" Sure sweetie, he'll be a regular Mother Theresa now that he has you in his life. Reading too many romance novels are we? Sorry if I am coming off harsh, and I realize I don't speak for everyone here, their opinion might be a little more forgiving than mine. But as someone who's been put through the same hell by my piece of sh*t ex-wife that you are putting your husband though, I feel extremely entitled to offer my opinion, since you asked for opinions. I too was a "good honest man" (still am...lol!) who did not deserve it. I was always completely faithful to her. I worked my butt off getting a software business off the ground so my ex could be a stay-at-home for our two kids, which is what we both wanted from the start. And instead of being appreciated for working long days and weekends, then coming home and being a good dad and working on the house and all that, she eventually winds up resenting me for not being around enough and winds up having an affair with someone...which I didn't find out about for 9 months. When I found out, I said I understood (to a point) why she did this and wanted to fix our issues, and resolved to change some things make our marriage better. She said she wanted this too....but her heart was never really in it. Three years later she did it again....this time I told her I was done and we are now amicably divorced (on the surface anyway) and sharing custody or our two kids 50/50. I say "on the surface" because when I think of what she did to me, not only the affairs, but to string me along for years...knowing she wanted out but not having the courage to act like an adult end our marriage the right way before shopping for her next man, my blood freaking boils. I can't explain it, but I feel like I lived years of my life now in some giant lie...I was happy and thought things were pretty good. Good people DO NOT treat people like this. She completely disregarded me as a person, and did what was best for her, with NO regards for my feelings. I didn't matter at all....my pain was just "collateral damage" to her in getting what she wanted. To this day (5 yrs later), while I deal with her respectfully on a daily basis regarding the kids, deep down I wish nothing but bad things for her. The scars of being treated like this, by someone that you loved and treated with nothing but respect for 10+ years, do not heal easily. I suspect they never will. I (half) jokingly tell my friends that I just hope she dies before me so that I can take a big sh*t on her grave, as my final revenge. Well, now you know how your "good honest man" of a husband will feel about you when he finds out. And I hope your daughters do turn on you...you f*cking deserve it. There, you asked for opinions.....oh, and good luck with your new man, he sounds like quite a catch! This post was edited by mkroopy on Fri, Dec 7, 12 at 13:14

Hello Everyone!!! Just wanted to come over and say hi to to all and make a few comments.. I did as you said mbntn74 and came back to read as if I was a " newbie"... Here is my take on the matter... We welcome all type of new people and we love the enthusiasm that they bring to the forums as well. Most of us come here to relax and post when we can and offer help when it's possible ( I work a lot of long crazy hours) so when I do read or post it's a way to relax. You initial post was a kind post with a lot of questions that asked things like " exactly". Sometimes it takes time to figure out what, when , where and how a new plant will react to your house . It depends on where its located, is it near heat? Ac vents? A southern Window? So many things to think about before you start to ask about how do I take this beautiful tree and give it a major overhaul before I know why I need too! Al was just trying to help you with links to guide you in a direction so it would be more helpful so that you can make the decisions for your own tree. He is very knowledgeable in most house plants issues and can point you to the information that you are inquiring about. Sometimes it might seem like others want one person to make up their own minds for them on soil, water, container, and mix before they really understand what's available and why you should pick the right one for you.. He really is a very patient person who helps so many people. Al has taught me so many different ways on growing, repotting and the overall care that I have learned to make my trees healthier. It took time to learn and it doesn't come on the tree ( tag instructions) for us... I hope you will go back and you reread this thread and see where Al was trying to send you so you could sit back and understand things before you take your beautiful tree that you have and start in on it without knowing why or what you are trying to gain. We really enjoy having all of our friends make offerings to help us when we have questions.. So I hope that you understand what I'm trying to explain to you. Good luck to you and your new trees! They are beautiful and I'm sure you will find what you are looking for once you spend a few minutes reading some great informative post that will help you and most importantly, help the overall health of your new trees!!! Perched water does exist and I have seen it in containers from long ago up until now with my mixes. Using a good fast draining mix makes it much less, but you will always have a little.. Just tilt your pot!!! Great points ronalawn!!! Great thread.. Hope I helped in some small way!! Thank you Al for all you do!!! I have learned so much from you and I will say that I'll always be learning ... It just doesn't end!!! Happy Gardening to you all... Laura

Hey guys, first of all, thanks to everyone that's helping. I've learned so much in the past two days. Specially Dave and Al...thank you teachers! :) So sorry about in the instrusion, I'm another one with fiddle leaf problems. I think I was sold a sick FLF...the guys just told me that it was in direct light all day long, so I thought the brown spots were justified. Until I got home and realized the soil was really compact...really....compact and soggy...and loads of rocks on top, which probably wouldn't help. So what I've did pretty fast, I went into despair...I've tried to repot it...and..of course I the roots just broke in half, and they were almost black and quite smelly... I didn't have anything around other than regular soil with perlite, so I just moved the lyrata and the now shorter roots too a new dry vase with some brick pieces at the bottom and that soil...the soil it's very loose and didn't compressed whatsoever. Didn't watered since, two days now. So after reading all of your kind info, Tomorrow I'm going too: 1. Clean the remaining roots as well as I can without damaging it more.. 2 .Repot, with 5:1:1 mix...Pine bark, Turf (should I?), Perlite; and some brick pieces in the bottom. 3. Water the lyrata once like flushing, right? And then again.. 4. The bottom leaves are very very rigid almost like they are about to break, I've read one Al's comment about "the end of life" process of these leaves...Should I cut the last leave and put the trunk deeper so it forms new healthy roots? (if this makes any sense at all) 5. Pruning, I was thinking about cutting the top (last picture), but as the bottom leaves are so stiff, maybe they aren't able to produce that much "food" and I should keep the top one for now? (I'm I thinking stupid??) 6. The only I had to cover the pot was sawdust, with which I have been lucky in protecting my plants from pests and mould. Again...in a despair act..should I maintain this? Can you help me please?? I'm based in Sintra,Portugal; very warm and humid location, actually humidity is a problem around here. Any advice is most welcome! thanks!

The browned leaf edges do look like overwatering. Were they there when you bought it? If so, all you have to do is to continue to monitor soil moisture like you did today, and hold off on watering until the dowel is dry. Do be sure to water slowly and thoroughly when you do water. For the rootbound plants I still have in their old soil, I water once until water begins to drain from the pot, making sure to go slowly and wet the whole surface of the soil evenly. Then I come back with my fertilizer solution and water again about 15 minutes later. If the pot was very dry I usually find that the pot takes longer to drain the second time, probably because peat that had become hydrophobic was allowed to slowly moisten a little so it could absorb water again. My pots have holds around the perimeter of the bottom, so tilting after watering works great even without a wick. When I found these forums last September I was ready to repot all my plants, which were weak and rootbound in very old soil. Fortunately I was persuaded to proceed more cautiously and to improve their growing conditions instead, the idea being that it's better to wait until the solstice to repot unless a plant is, as Al says, circling the drain (and I did repot the one schefflera that was doing just that in 5:1:1, with good results). I flushed them thoroughly with room temperature R/O water; bought some 100 watt, 5000k (bright white) LEDs and CFLs, put them in cheap clamp-on fixtures, and mounted them on a shelf above the plants on a timer so they'd get some light; for rid of a spider mite infestation; started fertilizing with a weak solution of Foliage Pro every time I watered; and diligently monitored soil moisture and watered properly when needed. All of my plants responded by perking up, and after a few months they'd gained enough energy and their root systems had recovered enough that they started putting out new growth. I don't have FLFs, but my ficus benjaminas did the best (I listed a few before and after photos in Dave's recent "Then and Now" thread), and they were much improved by the time the weather allowed me to put them outside. Here's where things went sideways, because some nagging health issues prevented me from actually reporting this season. I was really upset when I realized it just was not going to happen, but frankly none of my plants are in better shape than they've ever been, and I've really fallen back in love with the ficuses, which love their half-day of bright high altitudes sunlight so much that they've filled every branch with shiny healthy leaves. I'm sure they'd be even happier with pruned roots in gritty mix (I'll use a modified ratio to compensate for the desert conditions), but I've gotten good enough at compensating for it that they'll keep looking good for another winter, and now that I already have my ingredients and a lot of prepared mix I'll be able to jump into it next June whenever I have a little energy to spare. Al says that if you have two plants in the same condition, repot one in the fall, and repot the other one on Father's Day 2018, the second one will have more growth next fall than the one you repotted now. Some folks will say just go ahead and repot anytime, but your plant looks great despite having a couple of slightly damaged leaves, and they'll respond much better to repotting if you care for them properly and allow them to accumulate the energy they'll need to get through it smoothly. BTW, Cassandra's description of repotting is spot on if you're not going to prune roots. If I had your plant I'd wait until the plant's energy production was at its highest to make sure it will bounce back with some vigor, but Cassandra's method sounds like it would work great. Lenore