"Gregoire Kretz" wrote in message
...
Beeblebrox wrote:

It now has some dead braches with dried up brown leaves. However there
are
green leaves on some stems branching from the dead looking areas.

Much of the bush looks healthy and we've cut some dead stuff away.
Further
dead areas have appeared so I suspect some disease is present.
Surrounding
plants don't seem to be affected.

Can anyone suggest the reasons for the problem and perhaps a cure? Or
should
we just give it up as not worth pursuit?

I'm not sure it's necessarily a problem: many people (me included!)
worry about their plants too much and want to do something when the
plant itself is perfectly capable of taking care of business.
In your case it could be many things but it's hard to tell. Do you think
you could post a picture somewhere to give us an idea?

Without seeing more, it could be a very natural process by which more
branches at the top mean less light at the bottom and so the tree
doesn't bother with growing leaves there, concentrating on doing that
where they will be most productive.
The one in the garden used to grow taller and taller, spreading in width
as well. As it did the bottom and inside branches grew to look like they
were dead, and those that were simply fell (really not many).

When faced with something like your case, I try my best to keep the
shears away and wait for a while: after a few months the branch usually
shows very clearly whether it's dead or not.
I'd rather leave something dead on that cut something still alive.


Greg
--

You may ask yourself, how do I work this?

No ficus = no spam

Thanks all for the advice. I'll wait a month or so and see what develops.

Beeb