Growing Ficus Lyrata Outdoors: The Race is on! (in progress)

Plants

Jun 15

There’s a thrilling competition taking place on my balcony this year: I have three fiddle leaf figs that are growing in three different soil mixes!

(nerd alert!)

`Huddled together for a photo, only the little one is actually grown in this location`

I have a WSW-facing balcony in sunny California, (Zone 9b) and it gets very bright and very hot. It’s also extremely windy and I might honestly need to start tying some plants to the railings.

`These are the actual growing locations`

So here’s the deal:

I really love mixing up new batches of soil and trying different mixtures and I won’t stop until I’ve found Nature’s secret recipe!

The three mixes in play this year consist of very similar ingredients with different proportions. All three basically include: bark chunks (fir bark), potting mix (ocean forest), and perlite.

Before we get to the exact recipes, here are the ingredients:

Fir bark: chunks only, sized between 1/12” and 3/8” (roughly 2-10mm)

Bark dust: this is all small enough to fall through my 1/12” screen. It’s dustier than it looks in the photo, those chunks are tiny

Potting mix: trying Fox Farm’s Ocean Forest this year

Turface MVP: straight out of the bag (I don’t always do this) Make sure you’re using MVP, otherwise the particles will be too small

Perlite: I don’t remember if I sifted the powder out or not, I believe I used it straight out of the bag this year.

Lava rock (scoria): sized between 1/12” and 3/8” (roughly 2-10mm) I love the look of the multi-colored lava

The three mixes in this comparison are all very chunky in composition but hold different amounts of moisture. I’m curious to see if one greatly outperforms the others in any way. Theoretically, the mixture with the greatest amount of chunks (properly sized) will outperform the others although it will also require the most care in terms of water and fertilizer.

Popular soil theory says:

better aeration + more frequent watering/fertilizing = greatest growth possible

I’ve definitely confirmed this for myself by using gritty mixes and leca, but I’m curious to see how this will all play out in the battle of the balcony fiddles!

Now let’s get to know this year’s competitors!!!

Fiddle #1

Soil mix = 4:2:1 mixture of bark, ocean forest, perlite

58% bark, 28% potting mix, 14% perlite

72% chunks, 28% dust

I picked this fiddle up for work but the trunk snapped during transport (oops!) I didn’t notice until a month later when all of the leaves had fallen off and I took it home for rehab. It has since sprouted three growth tips near the base and they are all growing very well. It is slightly over potted because I wanted it to last 2-3 years without needing a repot at work.

The oversized pot and lack of mature leaves means that this plant definitely stays wet the longest.

It gets indirect light until late afternoon and then gets 3-4 hours of direct sun until dark. It also has the best protection from the wind. I believe this one has the best location of all three.

Fiddle #2

Soil mix = 5:1:1:1 mixture of bark chunks, bark dust, lava rock, turface mvp

62.5% bark, 12.5% bark dust, 12.5% lava, 12.5% turface

87.5% chunks, 12.5% dust

This is by far the chunkiest and fastest-drying mixture of all. It also has the most intense location with close to 8 hours of direct sunlight per day. It has to deal with very strong winds and overall has had a rough history.

Originally these were two separate, healthy fiddles that I decided to pot together to create a “super fiddle”. It was bushy and beautiful and after reading too much about bonsai one day, I decided to remove every leaf all at once (defoliation). This is a trick that causes plants to grow many more leaves than before, with a reduced leaf size. Well, it grew buds all over and was on its way to having dozens of branches when the root aphids hit and I had to treat it pretty intensely and repot it; all while it still had no real leaves! This left it stunted and it has taken a long time to recover. I’m hopeful that life outdoors will make it healthy and strong.

Fiddle #3

Soil mix = 1:1:1 mixture of bark, ocean forest, perlite

33% bark, 33% potting mix, 33% perlite; pretty sure that’s close enough!

67% chunks, 33% dust

This is the most basic mixture of all and it is working very well so far. I normally only use this on tropical plants (aroids) but it has given me impressive results already. I am not entirely convinced that this would be a great choice for an indoor ficus, but out on the balcony it is promising. I’m currently testing this mixture on lots of different plants indoors/out so I’ll be sure to write a separate post about it in a few months time. It’s definitely a great all-purpose mix.

This fiddle is shaded most of the day with maybe an hour of direct midday sun and then another hour of late evening/sunset light hitting it directly. As we move further into summer this should start getting more direct sun late in the evening (after 6pm).

This just put out it’s first burst of 3 new leaves since I brought it home and they do not have any red spots whatsoever. Perhaps this will be the best soil mixture of all for ficus lyrata. Only time will tell!!

John Dennery