My curiosity got the best of me and I could not sit back any longer. The tree just kept degrading more and more. So I said what the hell. I pulled the tree out of the ground and set it in a 5 gallon bucket of water. I then took a garden hose on low pressure and rinsed out the roots to get a better look at them. This is what I found.
The first pic shows the overall root structure versus the canopy of the tree once I had cut it back by about 50%. There are lots of small thin roots with the larger tap roots on the bottom quite small.
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.The next pic shows that the graft itself is extremely low to the rootstock. They must’ve grafted the scion to a short stubby rootstock. I hate this because it’s very hard to plant and keep the graft above ground but still cover the roots. Also of note is that the nursery left a piece of plastic wrapped just below the graft that was actually girdling the tree! I was able to remove the plastic but it took me a while. The plastic was durable and reminded me of the plastic associated with 6-packs of beer.
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.This pic you can see a very small white bug of some type. Not sure what it is but it was all white and had a body similar to a termite or larva of some type. Also look at the texture of the main root mass.
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.Lastly, here is a picture of the tree stuck back in the ground. It’s 100% native soil and I fanned the roots out widely in order to get complete coverage around them. (Helped my fig tremendously). I then clipped all the branches down to nubs but left some buds to see if it sprouts again. I know that conventional wisdom says that this tree can not survive what I just did to it and I’m sure it wont. But I look at it as a learning experience and found out a few things that make me understand why there is a lot of dislike for store bought potted trees. If it’s any consolation, when I pruned the branches back to nubs there was still green cambian.
So let’s take some bets! What’s going to happen to this tree? I say it’s a goner but nature never ceases to amaze me.