I try to never say never, but the "Celeste Fig" is a variety of the
edible fig "Ficus carica." The leaves on this are quite large, so it would
need to be a large bonsai. It is deciduous, not that that matters. The Ficus
(figs) you read about using for bonsai are more exotic varieties and the fruit is
usually not edible. Although Celeste might be cold hardy in the ground where
you live, I am not sure about a pot.

In a message dated 4/6/2005 11:24:19 PM Eastern Daylight Time,
writes:

I am interested in getting started in bonsai. I moved into a new
house in December and received a few fig trees in pots (grown from
cuttings). I am pretty sure it is a Celeste Fig, they are pretty
common down here in Louisiana. I planted one in the yard, but still
have one in a gallon plastic pot. It is about 12 - 16" tall right
now, and that is mainly new growth. Would it be possible to train
this into a bonsai, or is it too big already?

Thanks,



Billy on the Florida Space Coast

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In a message dated 4/7/2005 12:40:12 PM Eastern Daylight Time,
writes:

On this note, does anyone have experience growing Ficus Religiosa?
Anything
particularly strange about them that I should know (or anything about figs
in
general,

I think F. religiosa aka Bo Tree has rather large leaves also. They
are not cold hardy. Most Ficus respond well to pruning and (with the exception
of F. ben. and its cultivars) leaf removal. The white sap (latex) can be a
nuisance and irritating to some.
My favorite Ficus story is: About 1948 my family lived two blocks from
the ocean in Daytona Beach. We had a large F. elastic in the front yard of
our apartment house. (Well, it was large to a six year old.) The love of my life
can over to play and got latex in her hair. That was the end of our
relationship. Just as well, I met her later in my junior year at U of F and it was
clear I was too plebeian for her.
Billy on the Florida Space Coast

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Billy M. Rhodes wrote:

I think F. religiosa aka Bo Tree has rather large leaves also. They
are not cold hardy. Most Ficus respond well to pruning and (with the exception
of F. ben. and its cultivars) leaf removal.

I've heard this forever about F. ben and I don't know why it's the
conventional wisdom. I have 8 of them and I defoliate each of them
completely every other year. I remove every single leaf, and prune and
wire branches in June.

They live indoors from late October through mid-late May and then
outside in a protected area of my yard here in the Shenandoah Valley of
Virginia. We're at the edge of a couple zones, so I'm either 6 or 7
depending on which side of the hill you live on and if Murphy's Laws are
in effect that year.

I've had most of these trees since the 80's and they've survived drastic
pruning, complete defoliating and procedures like air layering and
grafting.

One hard-travelled one that I air layered still has both pieces potted
and growing. It was a standard about 4 feet tall and maybe 1" in
diameter at the soil line, with trifurcated top. Gift from a friend to
put in one of my restaurants. I wanted to make the top into a three-tree
planting and air layered it to do that. Took about 3 1/2 months to make
enough roots to divide it. The bottom had no branches when I started the
process, but a single one sprouted during the time it was being layered.
I had a tall stick with one branch and decided to make it into a cascade
because why not...?

I bent it over with some difficulty. It formed an awkward bend, so I
notched it, put in some screw-eyes and ran a steel wire with a
turnbuckle in it from one to the other and pulled it down. I gradually
tightened the turnbuckle to pull it down further and further and it was
working fine. The notch healed over the next couple years. I potted it
in an old straight-sided ceramic crock (took it from one of my
restaurants) where it still lives. It grew lots of new branches and I
was shaping them to suit my aesthetic. But then, disaster. It was on a
wall outside my then-residence in 1999 and a tree branch from a big
maple fell on it and broke it about 1/3 of the way along it's length.
The good lines were destroyed and the plant was looking like it was
dying. Leaves dropped. Branches died. It has recovered, but I stopped
trying to shape it while it was growing healthier. I've let it grow on
since then with only minimal pruning. I'll start doing something with it
again when I put it back outside this year.

The layered three-tree top suffered its own problems back in 2001 when
we got a surprise frost on October 1 and I barely got my tropicals into
the house. Some of the F. bens had their leaves lightly frozen. Lots of
branch dieback on the three-tree, including the middle of the three
branches. Now it's a two-tree with strange tops. Many of the small
branches didn't make it, so I've been pruning to get more branching.
Still looks thinner than I want. Couple more years.

But, back to subject. Defoliating F. ben can be done to good purpose. In
my case, the leaves come back smaller and there's also a lot of new
branching. It creates an opportunity to cut back long internodes and
shape the trees with nothing obstructing the views.

I've got mostly individual trees, but I have a group (F.ben.variegata)
and some of the small-leaf cultivars. They're all about the same when it
comes to the handling. Because they're indoor-outdoor plants that are
subject to the rigors of heating and air conditioning, I have them in a
soil mix that retains moisture more than the trees I have outdoors
exclusively. And the room they're in has a humidifier set to 45%. It
never reaches it, but it tries most gamely.

The white sap (latex) can be a nuisance and irritating to some.

I raises very pretty red welts on my skin that persist for a week or
more. I use rubber gloves when I'm working with my F. bens.

Pastorio

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In a message dated 4/7/2005 2:33:51 PM Eastern Daylight Time,
writes:

I've heard this forever about F. ben and I don't know why it's the
conventional wisdom. I have 8 of them and I defoliate each of them
completely every other year. I remove every single leaf, and prune and
wire branches in June.

One wisdom spread around here is that if you remove every single leaf
from the entire tree at one time it will come back but if you defoliate an
entire branch on one part of the tree and leave others, that branch is die back.
I have a F. ben. "Exotica" that I remove about 1/3 of the largest leaves every
two weeks, this seems to work for me.
Billy on the Florida Space Coast

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Billy M. Rhodes wrote:

In a message dated 4/7/2005 2:33:51 PM Eastern Daylight Time,
writes:

I've heard this forever about F. ben and I don't know why it's the
conventional wisdom. I have 8 of them and I defoliate each of them
completely every other year. I remove every single leaf, and prune and
wire branches in June.

One wisdom spread around here is that if you remove every single leaf
from the entire tree at one time it will come back but if you defoliate an
entire branch on one part of the tree and leave others, that branch is die back.

Well, that seems not to be true, either. Jerry Meislik has pictures of
partially defoliated trees in his book about ficus - some branches with
leaves, others completely defoliated. He specifically says that that
kind of partial defoliation is a valid training technique.

I have a F. ben. "Exotica" that I remove about 1/3 of the largest leaves every
two weeks, this seems to work for me.

Sounds reasonable. A little experience is worth a lot of theory.

Pastorio

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I have a Ficus that I have been working with for about 12 years. I started
a cutting that is now a nice tree. When I prune my tree i save the cuttings,
which do well.
I do not know the variety . The leaves look like a Benjamina and are
about that size, but the leaves are more leathery and the root swells. making it
a desirable Bonsai. From time to time I have lost all the leaves on some of
these trees. But they soon grow back. I have to treat this as an indoor
tree, but it goes outside for the summer. I have looked it up on the internet.
It appears to have a similar description as The Green Island. This is only a
guess on my part.

SteveW

Long Island NY

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On Thursday 07 April 2005 18:06, wrote:
I think F. religiosa aka Bo Tree has rather large leaves also. They
are not cold hardy. Most Ficus respond well to pruning and (with the
exception of F. ben. and its cultivars) leaf removal. The white sap (latex)
can be a nuisance and irritating to some.

Interesting, thanks for that.

My favorite Ficus story is: About 1948 my family lived two blocks
from the ocean in Daytona Beach. We had a large F. elastic in the front
yard of our apartment house. (Well, it was large to a six year old.) The
love of my life can over to play and got latex in her hair. That was the
end of our relationship. Just as well, I met her later in my junior year at
U of F and it was clear I was too plebeian for her.

Hehheh, a narrow escape there

--
Lee.

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