Ficus geniculata
A deciduous fig tree of the seasonal forests of South and Southeast Asia, from Nepal and India through Myanmar and Thailand to Indochina and southern China. It often starts life as a strangler and grows on exposed limestone and granite hills in fire-prone deciduous forest. It drops its leaves in the dry season. In India its young leaves and shoots are cooked or pickled. For growers it is a sun-loving, seasonally dry tree suited to large containers, a greenhouse or bonsai.
Where it grows wild
Specimen labels from Thailand describe open, fire-prone deciduous forest on limestone mountains, exposed limestone summits and sea cliffs, and the partly open margins of deciduous forest on granite. They also mention mixed evergreen–deciduous forest, sandstone rocks near streams, and dry evergreen forest. Wikipedia describes it as a tree of lowland tropical moist evergreen and deciduous forests. It may start as a hemi-epiphyte: one tree on Doi Suthep was a strangler whose host had rotted away. Collectors note it as a deciduous treelet 3–6 m tall on exposed rock, and up to about 10 m in forest.
Our records carry almost no usable elevation. Thai labels give 4000–6750 as elevations, which are almost certainly feet (about 1200–2050 m), and it also grows near sea level on coastal limestone. It seems to span lowland to lower montane levels.
🔒 Growing it like that
The wild conditions above, turned into targets for a shelf, a tent or a greenhouse. The full profile has:
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Profiles are drafts built from measured range and climate and from published sources; each section carries its own confidence in the app. Photo from Wikimedia Commons, used under its CC0 licence, unmodified.