Find out how to Encourage Branching in Rubber Tree Vegetation

Rubber bushes, Ficus elastica, are appreciated for his or her large, dramatic, leathery leaves. However they’ve a status for turning into a bit leggy after they’re grown indoors.

After we maintain the bushes inside, they often stay of their juvenile type, which might imply diminished branching and extra upward progress.

This may be disappointing, particularly because the plant grows taller and taller as a substitute of filling out with branches and foliage.

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Nonetheless, it’s doable to alter this progress behavior and encourage your rubber tree to department out.

Should you want an summary of find out how to develop and take care of rubber tree crops, learn our information.

Then, come again right here and we’ll talk about find out how to encourage branching in rubber bushes.

Right here’s what I’ll cowl:

Rubber Tree Progress Behavior

Should you take a look at a rubber tree within the wild, you may see that mature specimens might be properly branched with large, dense canopies.

However after we develop F. elastica indoors as houseplants, they’ll look decidedly totally different since they continue to be in a juvenile type. What number of rubber bushes have you ever seen which have a single stem? Most likely rather a lot.

Plenty of “bushy” rubber bushes that you just see on the retailer are sometimes a bunch of particular person specimens clustered into one pot to present a bushier, fuller look.

There are a number of causes that rubber bushes fail to department. These rising indoors typically don’t obtain sufficient mild, or at the very least not sufficient mild to develop large and bushy.

This causes them to have sluggish, stunted progress and keep in an immature type.

As a result of they tolerate low mild, many individuals take the chance to make use of rubber crops in darkish areas of the house. I do know I’ve finished it. F. elastica will develop completely properly in this sort of publicity, however they have a tendency to develop leggy and received’t department.

As they age, they may drop decrease leaves, making them look much more sparse.

So how will we repair this and encourage the rubber tree to department? Firstly, it’s a good suggestion to alter the atmosphere to make sure the plant is receiving what it wants, and secondly, cautious pruning.

There’s additionally a 3rd methodology, generally known as notching which will help branching.

Environmental Modifications

Whether or not you resolve to additionally do some pruning or not, which we’ll talk about beneath, you may encourage branching by altering the plant’s atmosphere.

An important issue is to supply further mild. Whereas rubber bushes can thrive in low mild circumstances, if you wish to encourage branching, extra mild is essential.

Set the plant close to a window the place it’ll obtain direct daylight for at the very least 4 hours per day.

Ideally, you’ll give it morning mild as afternoon mild might be too harsh for a plant that isn’t used to it.

If you wish to place your specimen someplace that it’ll obtain afternoon mild, be sure to introduce it to the stronger mild step by step.

Transfer it into the brand new space a half hour at a time. Which means you’ll take it into the brand new spot for a half hour after which transfer it again to its authentic spot. The subsequent day, add one other half hour and so forth till it may well stay in its new space.

Whereas these crops favor to be a bit root sure in a comparatively small container, you would possibly wish to change out the soil should you haven’t repotted or refreshed the soil for some time.

As soil will get older, it turns into compacted and the vitamins leach out.

Take away the plant from its container and gently brush away all of the soil from across the roots. When you’re in there, prune off any damaged or useless roots. Clear out the previous pot and repot the plant in contemporary, new soil.

In case your plant is in fairly a small container, it’s undoubtedly value upgrading to a pot one dimension bigger. Should you see roots circling the inside of the pot or coming out of the soil or by way of the drainage holes, it’s undoubtedly time to maneuver up a dimension.

With further vitamins from refreshed potting soil and the addition of a lot of daylight, your plant ought to begin to put out loads of new progress.

Pruning

Along with offering extra solar, you may encourage the plant to department out utilizing some cautious pruning cuts.

Whenever you’re pruning for this objective, you don’t wish to anticipate the dormant season, you wish to do the trimming in the course of the rising season as a substitute.

If you wish to prune in the course of the semi-dormant season, that’s high quality, it received’t damage something, however it’ll take longer for the brand new progress to develop.

Take a look at the spot the place you need the branching to begin and establish a leaf node. That’s the place the leaf emerges from the department. If the leaves have fallen off, search for the little lumps the place the leaves have been rising beforehand.

Take a clear pair of pruners and snip the stem off a couple of quarter of an inch above the leaf node at a slight angle. That’s it!

Now, as a substitute of manufacturing a single stem in that space, the plant will produce two, three, and typically 4 new stems proper there.

Be taught extra about pruning rubber bushes in our information.

Don’t overlook you can too use the pruned stems to propagate extra crops. So long as the slicing is six inches or longer, you may plant it.

Rubber bushes take extraordinarily properly this manner, although they’re a bit sluggish to begin producing progress, and you may have new crops to get pleasure from or give away.

Now, all it’s essential do is wait. The plant ought to begin sending out new progress within the space inside just a few months.

Notching

Ficus species have the power to ship out new progress when they’re wounded.

You possibly can benefit from this through the use of a method referred to as notching to encourage branching.

Basically, you’ll make a minimize within the bark of the stem or trunk that can trigger the plant to ship therapeutic progress hormones to the realm.

With sufficient time, that wounded spot will begin branching out.

To do that, placed on some gloves and seize a sanitized knife. Search for a naked space of stem between two leaf nodes.

Make a horizontal minimize about an inch above the node, deep sufficient that it cuts simply by way of the bark into the sunshine coloured materials beneath. The minimize ought to lengthen throughout half of the department. Make a second minimize a couple of quarter of an inch above that.

Scrape the bark away between the 2 cuts so the cambium layer beneath is uncovered.

That is greatest finished within the spring or summer season when the plant is actively rising, however you are able to do it any time of 12 months. Worst case state of affairs is that the notch received’t type any new progress.

After you’ve made your notches, you simply want to attend. Preserve caring for the plant as you’ll usually, and new progress will emerge beneath the notches.

Department Out a Bit!

Rubber bushes is usually a bit leggy, particularly when they’re grown indoors. However we are able to repair it with pruning, a change of atmosphere, or notching.

Earlier than you realize it, you’ll be having fun with your large, bushy plant.

Do you want any further recommendations on find out how to deal with a very difficult state of affairs? Tell us what’s up within the feedback part beneath and we’ll do our greatest that will help you out.

And for extra details about rising rubber bushes, try these guides subsequent: