I bought this FLF when she was just a teeny tiny plant at Walmart. I have had her for probably 4-5 years and my hope was to eventually have a tall tree with all the growth at the top and a bare trunk.
What I didn’t realize at the time was that this was a bush rather than the tree form.
She’s grown like crazy, but now the tallest trunk is falling over because it’s not very thick. I recently learned that wind helps it get stronger. So I have her outside for a few days.
I’d like to split the trunks and repot them as individual trees (and hopefully get the leaning one more upright). I’ve tried googling, but it seems both trunks are actually attached at the bottom…possibly one is just a large branch? Can I still split them? I think I’d actually have to saw it apart to separate them and that doesn’t seem right. Most of what I’ve read online made it sound like I’d only have to separate them at the root. The second pic shows the trunks, two of them are attached like a v shape.
Also the brown leaves are from one summer where I left her out in full sun and they got burned. I left them because I read somewhere that it would stop growing if you removed the bottom leaves. But it sounds like those are actually just using resources and I could possibly cut them off and it would still grow taller?
by stringsandknits
6 Comments
First get the dead brown leaves off
Rotate it to stop leaning from reaching for sun
If you don’t want it to split Google that and prevent it ~too much to text here.
When a flf is growing you should shake it 3x day or put a fan on it oscillating this strengthens the stem to support top growth
A top chop also strengthens the stem you could do that now
The brown leaves are draining energy from growth they’re not coming back
Wanted to update because I think my title was confusing. Looking for help on HOW to split my FLF into two trees, even though it’s attached at the bottom.
No don’t split it. You risk it losing a lot of leaves or dying from root shock. It’s still a tree not a bush. They just put three together so it looks more full.
Leave it alone and water it fully each time, looks like soil is dry and fully watering each time prevent hydrophobic soil issues causing dead spots on leaves. .
The soil looks dry..did you water it “thoroughly” each time？
This tropical plant is suitable for indoor and outdoor(as long as temperature is not below 5x°F/1x°C)..and it doesn’t get sunburn unless not enough water..
..and it’s too risky to separate it,don’t do that
……….and these wilted leaves won’t recover..you may remove them all