I now understand that the first version of pine fines I bought had too much dust. I should have came to that conclusion when I tried for days to dry it out before using it. You are right to be suspicious, but remember that the plant uses a lot of water from the grow medium, so how quickly a medium in a pot (w/o a plant) dries down isn't a very reliable point of reference.

The peat I bought is the Promix all purpose mix. It is 90% peat moss and has peat hummus, perlite, limestone and mycorrhizae added. Hear me out- since it is mostly peat moss I thought it would be better to use this version because it already has some perlite and lime and I would add a little less perlite to get the right consistency. Plus the mycorrhizae sounded like a good addition. I wouldn't be too excited about the fact the Promix contains Lime, perlite, and mycorrhizae. As minor fraction of the mix, it won't have near enough lime or perlite for the larger volume you're making, and the mycorrhizae is more likely to have lost viability than to be alive. It was found that more than 70% of the products advertised as containing living mycorrhizal fungi had only dead fungi. If the conditions in your containers is favorable to the fungi, it will be there. If not, it won't. I usually see clear evidence of mycorrhiza in spring/ fall/ winter/ but never summer.

The images look much better, but don't be chary with the perlite and make sure you have an adequate amount of lime in the mix.

Can you share the brand of the pine bark that you use or a brand that has the right size pieces to dust ratio? I know some people use orchid or reptile bark which seems to have no dust at all. Is this a better option?

The brand varies from year to year. I've bought Royal Gardens and and products from more than a dozen other packagers over the years. Focus on who stocks/sells it rather than the brand. The retail seller will be buying it from a wholesaler who gets it through a broker, so even the retailer seldom knows what brand it will be until it arrives.

To the left of the bark are stacks of Turface MVP for the gritty mix. To the right are the last of my stacks of Vita Bark brand fir bark that is packaged by Shasta Forest Products in CA. I bought 2 pallets of it when Oakhill Orchid Supply went under (Chicago area). It's too expensive for my taste now, so I'll go back to screened pine bark in the gritty mix when the prescreened stuff I have is gone. You CAN use the Reptibark for the gritty mix, but it a bit coarse for that, and it won't work all that well in the conventional gritty mix, but you can make a very good product with Reptibark, pumice, and Turface MVP (screened). Or, you can save the $ and screen your own pine bark for gritty mix.

The fig in the white planter seems to have stopped being so dramatic. Only the one lower leaf has the dark spot but it hasn’t lost any leaves or continued browning for over a week now. The fig in the brown pot unfortunately is down to about 7 leaves. It's good that things are starting to turn around. I know you're concerned about the leaf loss, but there are ways to fix that and force the plant to grow new branches from just above where every leaf is attached to the branch/stem. Get the plant back on track (pivots primarily on getting watering intervals right) and we can talk more about that in June. Growing well is very methodical and in sync with the plant's growth cycle.

Do you have your houseplants in growers pots that are in containers? I don't have much interest in houseplants other than the trees and succulents I grow. Most of my experience growing houseplants centered on showing how invalid the bias of detractors of the 5:1:1 and gritty mix was. Everyone thinks their favorite plant is completely unique and requires exacting care, when the fact is, most houseplants other than cacti and about 2/3 of succulents, want a well-aerated medium kept moist or damp, never wet or soggy. So, they would say you could never grow an African Violet in the gritty mix. or maybe a Jade in the 5:1:1 mix, so I would buy one, grow it for a year, repot it in the summer, then give it to someone I knew. My focus is almost entirely on bonsai and a few succulents for variety, but I have no trouble keeping houseplants in fine fettle.

My worry is that if the correct ratio of your mix drains a good amount of water, it would be a little difficult to lift these heavy figs and capture the drained water. I understand the importance of draining the built up salts though. How many days does it typically take for the mix to dry out? Most of my plants are in the gritty mix and in very small pots.

About half get watered every 3 days, the other half get watered every 6 days. While it's best to water your plants on an as needed basis, the gritty mix hold so little water between soil particles that it allows me to water on a schedule with no fear I might be over-watering.

If you're using the 5:1:1 mix and larger pots, there is no reason to think you won't be able to go 7-10 days between waterings, depending on all sorts of variables. If you have a collection saucer, lift the plant above the bottom of the saucer

so the waste water can't have a pathway back into the grow medium. The water should completely evaporate during the interval between waterings. Of course, you'll want your collection saucer to be deeper - the one in the image just happened to be at hand.

What is a ballast? (You mentioned employing an item for ballast.) Ballast is an item or items used at the bottom of the pot to occupy space that would otherwise be occupied by saturated soil. See D below - an over-turned pot used as ballast. The shaded part represents perched water; note how much less excess water is in the medium of D compared to A.

Below, bricks are used as ballast to displace soggy grow medium. Those bricks could be turned on edge and 2 more added to reduce by 90% the amount of excess water the planting is capable of holding. Ballast is a remarkable aid to growers who use overly water-retentive media, I don't understand why it's not widely suggested or explained.

Also, on another post I saw you recommended pinching fiddle leaf figs from June to September and then removing the winter growth the next June. This seems like a lot- is it so the tree retains its shape? I would like to learn more about your pruning recommendations for these FLFs! Winter growth is usually long and lanky and affects your trees appearance. In spring, I remove all winter growth back to 2 leaves per branch. From the 2 leaves, I get 2 branches.

When the new branches are about to open the 3rd leaf, I pinch it back to 2 leaves. Now I have 4 leaves with a branch in the axil (crotch) of each. The next time I pinch, I get 8 branches, then 16, 32, 64. This is the most efficient way ti increase ramification (branch and leaf density).

The plant below is a trailing ficus.

It's normal growth habit is long internodes and trailing branches. Have you ever seen a coleus this dense? Judicious pinching.

Al