Help with rubber plant

[Steve Sinor]

I have a rubber plant that is growing great. I would like to take some of it and plant it in other places in the yard. Does anyone know how to start new plants from the original one?

Growing in Florida

[Ricky]

Your Rubber plant is a fixus (Ficus elastica "decora"). It will root very quickly in moist soil. Be careful because once established they will grow very fast and very large. We bought one at Wal-Mart for $4 around 4 years ago and put it in the ground. It was around 18" tall when planted. It is now

25 feet tall with a 30 foot spread. I'm in South Florida, by the way.

[MC]

Wow! I thought you got rubbers at the drugstore.

[David Hare-Scott]

How big is your yard? How much of it would you like to be left in 10 years time?

They can grow to over 30ft high and wider than that. Under suitable conditions a handful of ficus elastica would dominate a large amount of a suburban block and run roots under the buildings and fences in a few years. The branches can become very heavy but not especially strong making them great roof and garden wreckers. Your neighbours may be sharing your joy, whether they want to or not. In Florida I would be afraid, very afraid.

If you are determined to proceed a tip cutting of about 8-12 inches will root easily in the growing season. The parent tree will probably bush out from where you take the cutting, thus improving it too. You can also layer them quite easily.

David

[simy1]

straight cuttings work very well with a rubber plant, in fact better with any other plant I have propagated (except vines or brambles such as kiwi or raspberry or forsythia). I have made several new rubber plants for friends. Use a 12" pot, take cuttings with only two or three leaves, dip the cut into rootone, stick it into the pot, water once, cover with a plastic bag, keep abve 60F. Believe it or not if the bag is on you have to water only every 3 or 4 weeks. Keep out of direct sun. Transplant to permanent location probably in early winter, I don't think you can transplant before summer arrives.

[Cereus-validus]

Do a google search on "plant propagation" and more specifically "air layering" and you will find your answer.

[W_D_GreatDivider]

The easiest way I have done it is to lightly scratch some bark on a limb (I don't think I bothered with this part even), wrap it with something like moist spanish moss, put plastic wrap around that (we are talking about something that would be about the size of a small hand grasping the area), and secure it with ties, rubber band, etc. You will soon see roots through the plastic and you can cut of the branch and plant it. Just keep it well watered. You can also simply take a branch and push it into the soil, place a brick on it, let it root on its own and again, cut and plant. DKat

[Dwight Sipler]

The process is called "air layering" in case you want to google it.