Benjamin the benjamin ficus is living in the enclosed porch for the summer

[cimorene]

Benjamin is one of several large and venerable potted plants inherited from Wax's granny, so he's probably older than I am; he has been in front of the east window in the kitchen since we moved here. However, he's had a hard time this spring after Sipuli peed in his pot several times to protest her litter box being smelly.

Once it got warm enough to not shock him in the process, Wax discarded all his old soil, shook and jiggled and rinsed his roots, and repotted him with new soil; and in apology for the trauma of that, she felt obliged to let him stay out for a while (but not fully outside, where the temperature fluctuations and wind and rain would be too much for him).

The thing is... Benjamin hasn't been pruned in a long time, and he's probably about six feet tall and four feet wide, now.

The porch isn't large.

As Wax put it when carrying out the recycling last week, it's not very convenient having your porch half full of tree.

She says she can't bring him inside, though, because he's enjoying himself so much (making lots of new leaves) that it would be mean.

Comments

[oracne]

Just so long as neither of you wander into the tree and fail to emerge....

[cimorene]

Fortunately, Benjamin isn't big enough to pose that danger to anything larger than, say, a shrew. His trunk is still like forearm-width. He tries to get as much coverage as possible with his leaves to look big and menacing, but he's still a pretty weedy guy.