Doesn't look too bad, if the black keeps spreading you might have some root rot. Don't over water them.. I do mine ever 10-15 days. Let it dry out more. You'll want to get a wooden dowell and sharpen it and poke it all the way to the bottom of the pot and make sure it comes out dry before you water again. It's the only real way to tell if it's dry enough to water. Search the forums and read up on tapla's posts, he's the ficus god around here! He'll tell you the same thing

"Is this normal"? Plants are reactive organisms, so every response to cultural stimuli
is a normal response, but that doesn't mean we shouldn't try to fix that
which wrecks a plant's vitality and/or appearance. You can start
by getting your watering under control. Do this by using a 'tell' to
inform you when it's the right time to water. More about using a 'tell'
below.

Self watering containers are generally poor choices for plants. I suggest you snap off the bottom and use it as a collection saucer, but lift the plant up above the effluent that drains from the pot so there is no possible pathway by which the effluent can make its way back into the soil. You need to prevent salts from accumulating in the soil.

If you have interest, I can point you to some tutorials that will provide you with an outline that should help you avoid all the mistakes that befall each of us at one point in time or another?

Using a 'tell'

Over-watering saps vitality and is one of the most
common plant assassins, so learning to avoid it is worth the small
effort. Plants make and store their own energy source –
photosynthate - (sugar/glucose). Functioning roots need energy to
drive their metabolic processes, and in order to get it, they use
oxygen to burn (oxidize) their food. From this, we can see that
terrestrial plants need air (oxygen) in the soil to drive root
function. Many off-the-shelf soils hold too much water and not enough
air to support good root health, which is a prerequisite to a healthy
plant. Watering in small sips leads to a build-up of dissolved solids
(salts) in the soil, which limits a plant's ability to absorb water –
so watering in sips simply moves us to the other horn of a dilemma.
It creates another problem that requires resolution. Better, would be
to simply adopt a soil that drains well enough to allow watering to
beyond the saturation point, so we're flushing the soil of
accumulating dissolved solids whenever we water; this, w/o the plant
being forced to pay a tax in the form of reduced vitality, due to
prolong periods of soil saturation. Sometimes, though, that's not a
course we can immediately steer, which makes controlling how often we
water a very important factor.

In many cases, we can judge whether or not a
planting needs watering by hefting the pot. This is especially true
if the pot is made from light material, like plastic, but doesn't
work (as) well when the pot is made from heavier material, like clay,
or when the size/weight of the pot precludes grabbing it with one
hand to judge its weight and gauge the need for water.

Fingers stuck an inch or two into the soil work ok
for shallow pots, but not for deep pots. Deep pots might have 3 or
more inches of soil that feels totally dry, while the lower several
inches of the soil is 100% saturated. Obviously, the lack of oxygen
in the root zone situation can wreak havoc with root health and
cause the loss of a very notable measure of your plant's potential.
Inexpensive watering meters don't even measure moisture levels, they
measure electrical conductivity. Clean the tip and insert it into a
cup of distilled water and witness the fact it reads 'DRY'.

One of the most reliable methods of checking a
planting's need for water is using a 'tell'. You can use a bamboo
skewer in a pinch, but a wooden dowel rod of about 5/16” (75-85mm)
would work better. They usually come 48” (120cm) long and can
usually be cut in half and serve as a pair. Sharpen all 4 ends in a
pencil sharpener and slightly blunt the tip so it's about the
diameter of the head on a straight pin. Push the wooden tell deep
into the soil. Don't worry, it won't harm the root system. If the
plant is quite root-bound, you might need to try several places until
you find one where you can push it all the way to the pot's bottom.
Leave it a few seconds, then withdraw it and inspect the tip for
moisture. For most plantings, withhold water until the tell comes out
dry or nearly so. If you see signs of wilting, adjust the interval
between waterings so drought stress isn't a recurring issue.

Al

it looks like what happened to my fiddle! it has burnt leaves!!!

Great! (The new leaves). If the stick comes out dry, now is a good time to flush the soil. Brief tutorial:

Flushing Soils

Water-retentive soils that can't be flushed during our regular water applications or soils that have been watered in small "sips" need to be flushed regularly to ensure salts from tap-water and fertilizer solutions aren't accumulating in the soil and limiting the plant's ability to take up water. To flush the soil of a planting: Water with room temperature water until the soil is completely saturated. Allow the planting to rest for 15 minutes to an hour so as much accumulated salt as possible goes into solution. Then, slowly pour a volume of room temp water equal to at least 10X the volume of the pot the plant is in through the soil. This will remove most of any accumulation of salts and resolve any skewing of nutrient ratios.

It's a good idea, no matter what time of year, to fertilize any plants that are at least reasonably healthy immediately after flushing the soil. Try to be sure you're using a fertilizer that has a ratio as close as possible to the ratio at which the plant uses nutrients. The NPK % listed on fertilizer packaging is not its ratio. 7-7-7 and 14-14-14 are 1:1:1 ratios. 9-3-6, 12-4-8, and 24-8-16, are all 3:1:2 ratios. Container growers should try very hard to avoid use of fertilizers advertised as 'bloom-boosters', or any number with a middle number (Phosphorous) higher than either the first or third numbers (Nitrogen or Potassium). These fertilizers can badly skew nutrient ratios with even the first application). On average, plants use about 6x as much N as P, so there is NO potential for a positive outcome when supplying many times as much P as the plant requires. I, and a large number of other members, use Dyna-Gro's Foliage Pro 9-3-6. It's designed to closely mimic the uptake ratio of the average plant, and has many other attributes not commonly found in other fertilizers. It also has ALL of the nutrients essential to normal growth. Summarized, it makes fertilizing as easy as it can be, and, from 1 container.

How you should fertilize depends on how you water and your soil choice. For instance, I use enough water that I'm flushing the soil every time I water (in summer). I fertilize with FP 9-3-6 every weekend when temperatures are appropriate. I withhold fertilizer when it's too hot or cold. The solution strength I provide it roughly twice the production rated suggested on the container. Unless your soil allows you to fertigate (fertilize + irrigate) like I do, your plants would quickly start to suffer or even die, because I depend on the soil flush with each watering. You might need to fertilize at the suggested rate, adjusted for the season, then wait a month or so and repeat a soil flush + a fertilizer application.

In the end, your goal should be to make sure all the nutrients essential to normal growth and good health are in the soil at all times, in a ratio that closely mimics the ratio at which the plant takes up the nutrients, and in a concentration high enough to prevent deficiencies yet low enough to avoid limiting the plant's ability to take up water. If that sounds complicated, right? It is if you can't water correctly w/o the soil remaining soggy so long it limits root function or wrecks root health; but, if your soil DOES allow you to water appropriately, either because the soil is a very good one or because you have taken steps to limit the soil's ability to retain excess water, it's monkey easy.

Al

Yes, it will over-water the plant, and then you fix it. ;-) The water should be draining out of the drain holes as you water.

What we're talking about now are stopgap measures you can take to alleviate the impact of a soil that doesn't drain well. Those symptoms are usually caused by too much water in the soil and/or a high level of salts in the soil. If your plant's root + soil mass can be lifted from the pot intact, after you flush the soil you can simply remove the plant from the pot and set it on a stack of newspapers, paper bags, or clean rags. This will effectively drain any perched water (excess water that tends to defy gravity and stick around causing poor root function and messing with root health) from your soil. If you can't lift the plant from the pot with the root/soil mass intact, I'll help you learn how to use ballast to minimize the effects of soil saturation. A brick might be an example of ballast, or large rocks, empty soda bottles with caps on tight, a plastic pot turned upside down, .......

The first watering is to make sure the soil is entirely saturated. This helps any accumulation of salts dissolve into the water. Pouring 10X the volume of the pot through the soil (I always use a garden hose with a water brake) allows almost all the remaining salts to dissolve into the water and be carried out of the pot.

The Masakuni water brake ^^^^ I use.

Did you, by any chance, read the link I provided in one of my posts upthread?

Al

The first thing I would suggest is that you read the info at the link I provided. I dearly love helping folks, but I think it's only fair to expect them to do some of the work.

I don't know if it was on this thread or not, but within the last few days I mentioned that 'people time' and 'plant time' are something quite apart. Plants are patently nonplussed by our unrelenting need to be somewhere and do something, all at a furious pace. They just do what they need to do with a nature more stoic than that of a cow standing shivering in the rain. IOW, it ain't gonna happen overnight. If you know what the plant's cultural wants are, and are providing them, the plant knows what to do and will do the rest.

Good luck to you!

Al