Would someone mind sharing if there is a way to get my flf back to the condition that it was in when I first brought it home? For the most part its been doing well, does not appear to be growing. When reduced to its elemental form, elevating your tree to a higher state of vitality is going to be a function of how good you are at providing cultural conditions in the plant's sweet spot, instead of close to or beyond the limits it's (genetically) programmed to tolerate. So, it can be done fairly easily, but you'll need to make some adjustments if the decline is to be reversed. If a plant is truly not growing, it is not making more energy than it's using, and that's a bad place to be ..... for a plant. When I brought it home in September it was much fuller near the base of each secondary branch. I have a good handle on watering and it is in a well draining mix from a greenhouse. When it was deemed time to water I would do so and then within a day or two it would drop a few leaves. This trend continued until I started adding foliage pro to each watering. I’m really annoyed by that because I was assured that the tree had plenty of fertilizer in the pot, I can even see the little green balls all over in the growing medium. I am thinking that I could have avoided it losing the ~30 leave it lost slowly after each watering before introducing foliage pro, back in December. Since using foliage pro I have had zero leaves drop. Some nutrients, like nitrogen, phosphorous, potassium, and magnesium are mobile in the plant. That is to say the plant can "steal" these nutrients from existing foliage and move it to where it's needed to support branch extension and growth of new leaves. Other nutrients, like calcium and several micronutrients are regarded as immobile in tissues and must be in the nutrient stream at all times in order for normal growth to occur. If the FP fertilizer curbed leaf loss, it's a good bet the leaves were being exploited for their nutrients and other bio-compounds prior to being shed. I would like to know the best time and if someone could also give me an idea on where to make the cuts for the hard prune that would be great too. I live in Chicago and all posts I’ve read say that late June would be best for a hard prune. I’m willing to do a hard prune, I’m excited to do it and see the rewards. I just need more information on how to do it properly. Good to see you come pre-armed with some knowledge of how to work with the plant's natural rhythms in order to help the plant recover faster from any extensive work you might do - primarily repotting and hard pruning. I think we're gradually changing minds with regard to the idea that a plant's foliage is sacred and not to be cut off under any circumstances. Growth is often viewed as so special that the plants appearance is sacrificed on its altar. I would do the pruning around Father's Day/ Summer Solstice. As soon as the plant starts to back-bud - you can repot (if it needs it, and it probably does). The pruning will be really easy and possibly done in 2 stages, depending on how close to the trunk the foliage is on each branch. Why not send a set of 4 images of the tree, rotating the tree 90* for each subsequent image in early June. Basically, you'll choose the leader, then prune all second order branches back to 1 or 2 leaves. The leader will be one node higher than the second order branches. A hard pruning represents a setback for the plant because you're removing growth that's been paid for. Living in CHI, you'll want to let your tree grow wild (unpruned or pinched) from Sep 1 to at least Jun 1. Then, pinch religiously from Jun 1 to Sep 1, such that when ANY branch shows a 3rd leaf that's open and moving toward maturity, pinch that branch back to 2 leaves. Soon, you'll be removing branches to let light and air movement into the canopy because it's too full. I have to do that to ALL of my trees older than a couple of years for health and to slow growth. BTW - your tree appears to have a very good basic structure to build on - so, good choice. Al

I work with these trees on a daily bases, I am a horticulturist ar a casino in Las Vegas NV . I seriously think it's a watering problem, these trees like it a bit on the dryer side. I also think repotting it was not the best thing either. Let the plant get dryer, get a probe to check the moisture down deep in the pot. Do not buy a moisture meter. You need a probe that will let you put up some of the soil to see how wet it is. Always, always use a soilless potting mix, everything else will retain to much moisture. Good luck.

After spending half an hour on the following post it occurred to me that a houseplant forum search for "nicking" might yield more accurate information. Sure enough, I found several threads containing Al's explanations, but I spent so much time on mine that I refuse to delete it!!!!! Here are a few of the threads. The nicking discussions aren't long but I think Al's post on the first link explains the effects of nicking vs pruning. Use the search box at the top of the page to find even more threads. http://forums2.gardenweb.com/discussions/1458989/fiddle-leaf-fig-question?n=1 http://forums2.gardenweb.com/discussions/1465570/pruning-ficus-lyrata-to-branch?n=24 ******************* My now-superfluous post: Ah, I see; most people seem to call that nicking, not slitting. The reason you haven't found info on it is that few people do it, but Al has gone into it the few times he's been asked. I'll describe it as best I can from what I remember of his posts about it. Anyway, you would use a sharp sterilized (just in case) knife to cut a small horizontal wedge through the cambium (basically the living usually green layer under the bark) right above a leaf node. Nicking (or pruning) above a node stops the inhibitory hormone from the top of the tree from reaching it, letting it respond to hormones that direct it to grow. The same thing happens when you prune. Whether you prune or nick, the amount of back-budding you'll get depends on the plant's condition. IMO, if the stress that caused your ficus to drop leaves still exists, nicking or pruning won't have much (if any) effect so long as the plant is still under the stress that made it drop so many leaves. I'd guess that's because the weakened plant isn't producing the hormones that would stimulate growth above ground. That's been my experience. My ficuses didn't respond at all to tip-pinching last fall when they were still weak, but now after months of proper care and increased spring sunlight they're growing like crazy, including a lot of back-budding far back on its once-bare branches, without any intervention at all from me. I think that's an accurate description of what I've read!

Nothing is drooping in your pictures. And leave the small brown leaves alone. They’ll drop off when they’re ready. Try to resist the temptation to ‘help’ your plants. They don’t need it.