Ficus microcarpa 'Ginseng' mame?

Hey everyone,

I bought this sickly little ficus at my local nursery today. It was in the sale plants section for a whopping $4. I bought it to try to make a decent mame out of it. It may look dead, but there is a fresh shoot growing up from the top, and there are buds all over. I did remove a few dead looking branches, but believe it or not, most of them are still alive. I, of course, am going to repot it, but currently my soil is drying because I had to wash all of the dust off of it. I use Oil-Dri for soil, with a large amount of bark chips. I luckily got a good bag of Oil-Dri that does not mush. Hopefully my soil will also work and I will be able to get this little guy to recover.

Before repot:



After repot (reverse taper!):



Someone on another forum had wondered about me training this little guy to look like a Baobab. Any thoughts on that? I had kind of thought about groundlayering it at the section of trunk I uncovered, then getting some nice basal flare from there. But, I will leave it open to hear what the pro's have to say. Comments and advice always welcome,


Ryan

Ryan,
IMHO----
Baobab design is for Baobab. Pine tree design is for pine tree... ficus is for ficus.
trees made by us people lost their natural appeal because we tried so hard to changed their character...and in the end the design fails...time and effort wasted.

your baby ficus will easily outgrows your current pot. when it is the right time to repot, a much bigger pot would be helpful.

regards,
jun

I do agree with you there jun, thank you. I thought training it like a Baobab would look interesting. But, I'm open to suggestions from anyone. Hopefully this guy will recover and then I will have a lot more branches to work with.

Anyone agree with groundlayering that section of the trunk I uncovered?

I am not sure what you mean by "ground layering" but I think as you let it grow out in the new pot, that section at the base may enlarge.

A reminder. That swollen base is a storage root. It will never grow any branches. They will only come out the top. Is that what you want?
Iris

Ryan,
try to grow the tree first, the base or nebari will be developed on its own because your tree is still in its infancy stage. as the trunk and branches grow so will the roots and nebari. there are various style for ficus you can adopt later on. the best way to do for now is to wait for your ficus to develop the branches, then you can select the style suited for the tree. If you let your ficus alone for now it will develop faster, with your interference on it for the sake of future design you are also interfering with its growth.

regards,
jun

bonsaisr wrote:A reminder. That swollen base is a storage root. It will never grow any branches. They will only come out the top. Is that what you want?
Iris

Yes I figued this. It doesn't bother me though. I figure I can still do something with it.

jun wrote:Ryan,
try to grow the tree first, the base or nebari will be developed on its own because your tree is still in its infancy stage. as the trunk and branches grow so will the roots and nebari. there are various style for ficus you can adopt later on. the best way to do for now is to wait for your ficus to develop the branches, then you can select the style suited for the tree. If you let your ficus alone for now it will develop faster, with your interference on it for the sake of future design you are also interfering with its growth.

regards,
jun

Thanks Jun!

I am going to let it grow for a good while, probably another year or so to see what kind of branches I can get from it.

Thank you all!