Hi All,
Before I am going at my questions, I like to thanks all of the guys had
help me before.
I bought two Green Island Ficus for my winter bonsai. One is two inches in
trunk diameter,19 inches tall with nice movement in trunk line but need to
cut it down to replace apex for taper. My second one is 1.75 trunk and
straight as a bamboo. I think i am going to make a banyan style out of that
one.
Does Green Island Ficus bud back easy when doing trunk chop? What is the
best time to carry out the job? Is there a certain method to trunk chop for
banyan style?
Thank you all
Hung Le. VA zone 7

I choose not to be a commom man
It is my right to be uncommon as I can

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Hi Folks,
What species is the Green Island Ficus?

Cheers

Rob

Green Island Ficus buds back beautifully. It also gives a very quick
response to any pruning, defoliation, etc.

I defoliated all my GI Ficus last week. New leaves are already appearing.
I'll leave it to others about how to chop.

I have one about the size of your straight one that had been chopped in the
nursery long before I worked on it.
It is also budding back beautifully. I did, however, carve the chop to get a
more graceful end to the trunk.

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I bought two Green Island Ficus for my winter bonsai. One is two inches in
trunk diameter,19 inches tall with nice movement in trunk line but need to
cut it down to replace apex for taper. My second one is 1.75 trunk and
straight as a bamboo. I think i am going to make a banyan style out of
that
one.
Does Green Island Ficus bud back easy when doing trunk chop? What is the
best time to carry out the job? Is there a certain method to trunk chop
for
banyan style?


Green Island Ficus buds back beautifully. It also gives a very quick
response to any pruning, defoliation, etc.

I defoliated all my GI Ficus last week. New leaves are already appearing.
I'll leave it to others about how to chop.

I have one about the size of your straight one that had been chopped in the
nursery long before I worked on it.
It is also budding back beautifully. I did, however, carve the chop to get a
more graceful end to the trunk.

Regards,

Bart

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Speaking of Green Island Ficus, I've got one where the first main branch is
proportionally too large for the rest of the tree. So, I decided to try for
the Banyan look rather than start over. The large branch has two small
branches that start underneath and I'm hoping to train these down, ground
layer them, and then once they root - chop off the rest of the branch...thus
turning them into air roots. First - is this a viable strategy? Second -
any way to encourage rapid growth of those branches? I have avoided pruning
them when I did the rest of the tree, but it doesn't seem to have made much
difference.

Jeff Isom
Cleveland, OH / Sunset Zone 39

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----- Original Message ----- ,
What species is the Green Island Ficus?

Ficus microcarpa

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In a message dated 6/30/2003 11:30:39 PM Eastern Daylight Time,
writes:

First - is this a viable strategy? Second -
any way to encourage rapid growth of those branches?

Jeff
Do you expect the rooted branches to look like air roots? They will
be branches or trunks. If you cut of the mother branch where will the layered
plants attach to the main tree? Sounds more like a grove to me.
This is a tropical and Cleveland isn't so growth is going to be
slower.
Billy on the Florida Space Coast

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Billy,

The secondary branch will remain connected to the primary. I would strip
off all of the leaves but the last couple (this part of the secondary branch
would be like the right side of a U). The bottom of the U would have the
bark stripped off, rooting hormone applied and be buried in the soil. Once
it has taken root, the right hand side of the U would be cut off - leaving
the former secondary branch growing downward and rooted in the soil.

Yeah, I know we have a REALLY short growing season here. It does stay
pretty warm and humid (in a normal summer) for June - Early Septemeber,
though. And I had pretty good success over the last winter with a room in
the basement set up with a humidifier and Metal Halide lighting. Not nearly
as good as the real thing - but growth does continue.

Jeff
Cleveland, OH / Sunset Zone 39


First - is this a viable strategy? Second -
any way to encourage rapid growth of those branches?



Jeff
Do you expect the rooted branches to look like air roots? They will
be branches or trunks. If you cut of the mother branch where will the
layered plants attach to the main tree? Sounds more like a grove to me.
This is a tropical and Cleveland isn't so growth is going to be
slower.
Billy on the Florida Space Coast


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