Dripper and a Ficus

[rmhawk]

I have 2 ficus's in my setup and i have a dripper that drips all day when i am at work. I noticed that when i get home one of the ficus drain plates is full of water cause it drips all day off a few bottom leaves and into its pot. Is this going to be bad for the ficus? Is it basically watering it all day or is the water just making its way to the bottom in those few little drop spots?

 

[chameleonman57]

How big is the pot, if it is pretty big, then it is watering the ficus all day and make sure to turn the dripper off at night so some of the water can evaporate at night.

 

[rmhawk]

How big is the pot, if it is pretty big, then it is watering the ficus all day and make sure to turn the dripper off at night so some of the water can evaporate at night.

It's an 8" pot. I've read that watering a ficus too much is bad for the ficus. Think i should spend the money and setup a drain system so the ficus doesnt get watered all day? I know i can make a cheap draining system...right now im just using paper towels on the bottom.

 

[chameleonman57]

Sounds like you already know what to do, good luck.

 

[laurie]

You could try putting the plant up on a stand (wire, upside down flower pot, etc) with holes for drainage for the ficus until you work out the overall drainage.

 

[cushcameleon]

Drainage systems are easy to setup. I say you try that out first, how is the overall health of your plant? I have a useful blog entry about how to prevent overwatering https://www.chameleonforums.com/blogs/cushcameleon/131-custom-plant-soils.html#comment235.

 

[tkilgour]

ficus hate over watering, plus too much moisture will attract fungus gnats. I hate those things. ONe thing that has worked for me it to use a drip cup to catch the water, I just put a screen over it so feeders do not drown or my chameleons. I set this next to the plant and the drips run off the leaves into the bowl and some into the plant keeping just the right amount of moisture. It takes practice but is not hard to figure out. Good luck my friend. Ficus lose leaves regulary anyway and lots of water is not good for them.

 

[spadefish]

I had the same problems until i discovered self-watering plants at Home depot. The pot that contains the plant sits in a larger pot with a fabric "wick" atttached to the bottom of the planted pot. That wisk sucks up only the water that the plant can hold. If you water the plant too much, the water will go down the wisk and settle in the collecting pot. Just empty the collecting pot. Not perfect, but it helps a lot with drainage.