Fiddle Leaf Fig "Almost" Complete Care and Tip Guide

how do I make my fiddly fig bushier how do I make it into a tree form can I separate them if there are multiple plants in one pot and the answer is yes yes and yes and I'm gonna show you I can actually do it with you well not with you but I'm gonna do it and show you how I do it and hopefully you have patience because takes time takes time to get it to be bushy and it takes time to get it to be a tree but it doesn't really take that much time to separate them but it takes time for them to grow up and become fuller and bushier in trees and bushes and things like that so yeah I have a few here and actually will just show you instead of talking about it because a lot is discovered through showing stupid yeah I am dressed like a mime today maybe I'll just mine everything we'll never finish to mime school actually so yeah we're gonna learn how to prune meaning how to shape fiddly figs how to make them into trees how to get them bushier and how to separate them if there's a few in one pot because I'm often asked these questions and I'm trying to type out the answers and like I just want to show you it's easier to show it so I'm gonna get on the floor and start to get to work so I want you to join me on the floor please come on let's go [Music] we get a fiddly fig and we look at it well looks pretty sweet it's got big ol leaves on it this is a giant leaf it's like two of my hands we need three and we think okay it looks great now but what it's gonna what is it gonna look like in two to five years that's if it lives well what's gonna happen that you have two in here and that's fine because you can you can have two plants in one that's totally normal but some people want to separate it because they want to have individual trees maybe have one on one side of the house one of the other I don't know do whatever they want give one away that's fine do whatever you want with it so let's figure out when the best time of the year to do this I'll tell you you have to figure it out it's now it's late winter early spring because the more damage you do to a plant it means the whole growing season to recover from any kind of stress or cuts or anything you've done to it so now is the time if you want to do this let's do it together get your figure out it's some sort of torque or box and let's separate okay so we're do now is take this double twin baby pull it out of the box okay this is not Ruben one bit it's actually going to be easy to separate it so maybe pull it back here this leaf might fall off to get his ripped the idea is to not really cut the roots as much as trying to separate them by hand but you're probably gonna have to cut them so and I don't know if I have patience to unwind every single little root thing here so yeah that's gonna probably last me about ten seconds and I'm gonna go back to cutting it because patience for this so you can use your hands if it's a loose like this or you can take a sterile pair of pruners and use the pruners to cut it but I think I can actually do this by hand but what I want to do is I'm holding the tree up or the trees so I don't damage the foliage and slowly separate with my thumbs and I have done this a gazillion times in the garden because I was a gardener slash landscape designers last landscape company owner and I've done this a lot just saying this woman's got a little bit of experience and now I'm you want to have an equal part so because this is actually planted pretty well you want to have a root ball that's equal portion on either side so you don't stress either one out too much so I'm just gonna do this quickly well I'm quickly I'm just gonna do it properly and if I can loosen and I will like I this main root as soon as I can pull it a little bit so that's not gonna be damaged and yeah this is actually going much smoother than I thought so you can see that separation any big finger like roots just pull loosen up so this one this left twix gets one there's the right twigs gets one on this side I can feel it alright so what was that getting somewhere I'm getting some of our Fela I feel a divide we've separated the twins okay perfect so now I'm gonna pop them where's Steve oh you know yeah you ran away after people kept saying uh : a mister plant arena he wasn't that he was not happy about that I am happy about that can you see this super dark so I guess it's not that dark okay anyway that's better the lights better you get the idea I'm just gonna put soil in it the soil concoction peat worm castings and pumice and it's done you could put bark chips in here you can put all sorts of stuff that you have that's local to your to your area because not everybody has peat moss net one here you go put you over here on the plant rug and then I have one more uh uh what number two I'm so thrown off by getting my hair done because it took up so much time and I just don't like spending time in a hair salon please makes me anxious but they were good like they put lotion on my hands and rub them and rub my scalp okay we're gonna get this filled up make sure that we Center this fig in the pot so it grows straight push down lightly get the air pockets out and also make sure that this is not gonna fall over you can put a stake in it if it's a little wobbly if you didn't get a really big root ball but if you did it right you shouldn't have to okay so now we have two single figs that we're going to play with to try to get them to branch and become fuller okay cut so here we have a case where this fiddly fig is tall and skinny and we might like it like that or we might think I want a tree I really want a tree and I couldn't find a tree and this is what I've got so you buy it you bring it home you love it and then you think I wish you were a tree and then it's still just a stick with the leaves which is fine I like that too it's it I love the vertical element I love the fact that it could go in a corner or someplace whatever it's just it's not a tree how do you make it a tree this is how we're gonna do it and it might feel painful and you might think I don't want to do this to my fiddly fit because I spend a lot of money on it but you're gonna do it if you want this to happen so here it goes first thing we're gonna do is locate some inter notes and the inter nodes are the spaces between the leaves the leaves grow at the nodes and so that's while the node and then the section between the nodes is called an inter node what we're gonna do if we want our figs to branch out not to create more leaks but to create a branch we want to cut above the note if you cut above the node you'll stop the growth regulating compounds that travel from the top to the bottom and it'll prevent it from reaching that bud right and so that bud will then come out dormancy and pop out a new branch that's the theory that's what works so that's what we're gonna do so I need to find an area where I want branches to come from so I'm looking at a leaf scar here's a node right here okay and I'll show you a close-up shot of it but I'm going to cut about a third of the way around stem and about a third deep into this down and once you've known once you see this milk SAP like sappy milk come out you know you've done it right so I'm gonna do that and I'm gonna show you what close-up shot of that okay you see that is the node and actually this is where there was a former leaf right here and there's a bud right there so I'm gonna go right above that bud and make a cut with my sharp pruners that have been sterilized and just come in like that go around do I see SAP coming out I see SAP coming out you see it that's when you know you've done it right I want I want a stem to come out on the other side here so I'm going to cut like that careful watch your fingers slice it in that saps gonna come out you see the SAP come out you've done it right okay so now we've notched it that's called notching [Music] so there there are a few ways you can pinch it yep your honor promise you and you can either take a section off of the plant if you want you can take a whole section off of it and propagate the top of this which I might just I might just do that I'm gonna do that much show you so I'm gonna do like more of a heavy dramatic pinching but before I do that I'm going to show you how to do a less dramatic pinching there is a bud inside here and all you have to do is find the tip of it and twist twist it off I'm not going to do that because I want to keep this bud here so this section that I removed will actually grow I might do that on the other one just to show you but so what I'm gonna do is a more dramatic cut so I'm gonna take I'm gonna I'm gonna take it right here so I'm gonna take about up stem I'm gonna think about maybe only six inches of stem and I'm gonna kind of right above this leaf here like that ready cut all right that hurt that sound hurt but it's not in look you're gonna have the dripping of the SAP don't touch it because it will irritate your skin so just you should be wearing gloves but I have hands like leather so it doesn't really matter so I'm not gonna remove any of the bottom leaves because you know why if it's making energy why remove them and leave it and then they'll probably naturally drop because these aren't looking so hot and then ultimately we'll have a branch a branch and then we'll continue doing that and then remove the lower leaves and this will become more like a tree you are looking okay [Music] so this guy let's just say he has had time to have his roots establish and we are going to just give it a little we're just gonna give it a little pinch I'm not gonna notch this one I'm just gonna pinch this one because I just want to encourage more growth on the top so eventually it will become a tree and then then we can remove the lower leaves so let's just keep it as it is and just pinch the top bud off of it so can you see this let's find the top bud here's the top bud see that bud little brown thing I take the brown out maybe you'll see a real bud okay well - you said knock it out try to twist it kind of did it kind of messed it up but I did well I just want to show you what it looks like when it's gone okay so here hold on yeah see then they stopped coming out so basically the bud looks Brown the good is covered with this this sheep but once you remove the sheath you'll find like a little it looks like a little tooth you know just pull it twist and pull so now this should force lateral growth probably lateral leaf growth and possible possible growth of stems stems branches I mean branches [Music] we're left with this top cunning when I did the severe tip pruning we're left with this and I mean it's beautiful he is I felt terrible about doing it so I'm gonna put this in a soil medium and cover it and hope it grows roots I think it's going to it needs to be hot and humid so we need to create this little microclimate for this micro environment so I'm Olga I'm gonna sacrifice a leaf because I need to be able to get this into the soil stressful stressful so which one's going maybe the biggest one look at this I believe though like come on I will leave that one I'm gonna take this one no I had to take it and you know what I'll do maybe I'll leave propagate this one I've cut this out of 45 so I've got this super gorgeous leaf yeah I'm just gonna propagate everything because why not and we have a clean cut here in the bottom 45-degree cut and I prepared a mixture well it's the same mixture it's just in a smaller container I'm gonna shove this in like that water it and then cover it with plastic I know plastic is bad but I think we all have plastic black bags that we've been saving so find one of them and cover your fiddly fig cutting up with it [Music] fiddly figs as I said before it need plenty of light at least six hours of indirect sunlight a day and honestly they can take direct sunlight for a few hours out of the day because think about it they grow out side in the tropics in the Sun and they're happy so I think the thing to do is when they're young acclimate them to the environment they're gonna be in probably for the rest of their lives in your house because they don't like to be moved they like to be rotated if you have a plant you know you notice it's leaning just like like like like a quarter of a clock turn every couple of weeks so it starts kind of facing this ELC it's just just rotated about every two weeks or when your water it maybe once a week that's fine okay so let's talk about the watering it's not just like water once a week with these guys because you remember everybody's house is different everybody's temperature is slightly different everybody has different light exposure and the most important thing is that they're sold in different soil mediums some are sold with super barky soil and you water it and the water just comes right through so guess what that means it means have to water a lot more often some come in a very dense soil like a heavy peat or a heavy cocoa coiour and then it absorbs and it holds on to the moisture a lot longer so you will probably be watering less but if that particular tree with that heavy dense soil is in a bright bright Li lit area and it's warm you're gonna be watering more what else so let's talk about okay there's lots of issues there's a lot of issues when it comes to leaf drop all right the leaves will drop I'm sorry you bring it from a nursery or a greenhouse it's living in like the optimal prime conditions and then you bring it to your house thank you my house is pretty good it's got a lot of light it's pretty humid maybe maybe not your leaf is gonna tell you you're fiddly fig is going to tell you and most of the time they're going to drop leaves when you bring them home they just do and one or two even three leaves is fine don't panic it's it's its way of adjusting to your environment if it drops a lot of leaves like all of them yeah there's a problem and it could have it could be a number of problems and usually the number one problem is light it's not getting enough light or you brought it home and it was freezing and I was outside in like the 10 degree temperature or it was over watered in the nursery and you brought it back and watered it again I mean there's a list of issues that it could be but one or two or three leaves dropping in the first few weeks don't worry about it also the Browning around the edges of the leaves could be due to lack of humidity lack of light lack of water too much water or over fertilization fertilizing fertilizing fiddly figs is important because there are massive leaves right there just like giant big like flippers like swimming flippers and they make a lot of energy but they use a lot of energy and the bigger they are the more energy they make and use so let's just say that it's crucial to fertilize these guys and they will green up and they'll grow faster and they're chunks will get thicker so yeah let's do that let's fertilize these guys and I read someplace that the best breakdown of nitrogen phosphorus and potassium is like a 3 to 1 to 2 ratio so slightly higher nitrogen and kind of like equal parts phosphorus and potassium that's what I say what else about you guys um Oh occasionally you wanna if specially with these like the single stem fiddly figs if they're inside you want to wiggle the stem a little bit and if you wiggle the stem that sends a message to the feeder roots to grow a little bit more so we can anchor down and stand withstand the winds that it thinks is going to happen eventually so wiggle it maybe once a day or when you're watering it just wait and then you'll have a sturdier base and also the trunk will go grow thicker that way um what else about fiddly figs I'll get back to you in a second I gotta I gotta figure it out so it's the fertilizing it's the soil it's the light insects I want to talk about insects but the way to avoid getting insects or pests on your fiddly fig is wash the leaves and if you wash the leaves guess what they make more energy because there's not like a coating of dirt all over them and you know this makes sense so watch the leaves and you'll be washing off pests take it out in the rain put it in the shower as often as you can because they just are gonna look better and they're gonna be protected against aphids and mealy bugs and thrips and white fly whatever just bugs Brown edging also could be an indication that is really low humidity in your house so amping it up with a humidifier it will help tremendously you might even need a few humidifiers to bring the humidity up there's a little tiny diffusers don't work you need to get like you need to get a real humidifier in there you want it up over 50 really 60 to 80% is what they're after so you know they're gonna not be perfect if it's under 50 and they're gonna drop leave so humidity is a giant factor with fiddly figs the thing I forgot to say before is that you cannot grow a tree from a leaf cutting so yeah it's just gonna look pretty cool for a while but you're never gonna have a tree just might be a bunch of leaves like that I think so what I was told I don't know everything about fiddly figs I just know enough to tell you what I know and these other things I got mystery because I haven't done it I'm doing it I have one in that thing right there and I'm gonna grow some roots in it I'm gonna tell you in a month and then the year I hope it's still alive if you have any more questions that I can answer please feel free to put it in the comments I don't know if I have any more information maybe you have more information about this stuff that would be great because I think we all can learn from each other and I'm happy to take advice and criticism well not so much criticism but I'll take it I'll take it like a woman again thank you so much for coming and joining I hope this explains some things some of you guys were asking about just forming and trimming and shaping fiddly figs it's not difficult it's just painful to make that first cut so you gotta just get in there and do it and have patience and wait because eventually it'll happen bill but out I'll do a follow-up in a few months and show you what's going on with them and hopefully they're in good shape have a great weekend [Music] I find that watering your figs in the morning is the best time to water them because it gives the plant an opportunity to pull up and use all the water during the day and not at night and also if you're going to mist or heavily humidify high chubby your tree and leaves do that in the morning as well because you don't want water sitting on top of the big leaves and cuz that can create an area for fungus and bacteria to grow em you don't want that because that's another cause of those big red disgusting looking brown marks on them so just do it in the morning and sometimes you might see those little tiny little red spots on the new leaves do I have any here I don't think so don't worry about that they disappear it's just I think an overabundance of water in the cells and it's creating this prismatic miracle I don't know what it's doing but they go away the first time I saw that I freaked out I said this is some kind of rust to some kind of disease but then it was gone so don't worry about those little tiny red it looks like someone sprinkled cinnamon all over it but they go away chubby over time your plant will lose its lower leaves most likely don't freak out about it because it's just going to create more leaves on top so it's just that's why they end up looking at my trees and becoming trees they lose their lower leaves right is this natural I put a lot of pictures of some big fiddly figs up on Instagram and people like holy moley that's big but the root ball is so small it's in such a small container they like it I'm saying they like it so why change a good thing so my theory is they like to be slightly rebound or actually potentially heavily rebound and then you bump it up when you feel like it I don't know when that moment is maybe when the the roots are growing out of the pot or they're growing out from underneath that to me indicates they need to go don't be so quick to bump your plants up just because you feel like you have to because everybody else is doing it don't be doing what everybody else is doing just do what you want to do that's my advice if your fig is looking healthy leave it just back away from the fig and if you can't if you can't pick it up and you don't have a container big enough and it's just at the end it's at a giant it's not like a 30-inch diameter container you just gonna have to leave it eventually right so at that point just top dress it with worm castings and compost and give it the nutrients it needs and it'll live a really really long time that way so sometimes this is at the end you can't go any bigger I don't like to say don't or do or don't or do I recommend not using leaf shine because I think any kind of oil or weird stuff that you put on it just clogs the pores and why do you want to do that to your leaf of your trees that you love you don't want to clog your own pores why do you want to do it to your plants use water use one mortar and just just you know clean it clean it and that's it don't put oil like coconut oil stay away from that stuff in my opinion I was gonna say IMO but like that's just my son would be mortified that's it chubby come here so I have to say about fiddly FIGS

Channel: PLANTERINA

Views: 1,055,945

Keywords: indoor plants, house plants, houseplants, houseplant care, indoor plant care, fiddle leaf fig care, ficus lyrata care, pruning fiddle leaf fig, shaping fiddle leaf fig, trimming ficus lyrata, how to prune a fiddle leaf fig, high light houseplants, living room houseplants, best houseplants, best indoor plants, bright light plants, pinching trees, indoor plant gifts, indoor trees, interior plants, plants for large spaces, notching ficus

Id: mZiNPElrsBA

Length: 26min 7sec (1567 seconds)

Published: Fri Mar 29 2019