Hey everyone-

First time poster. I searched the forums but couldn't find a similar post, so I wanted to ask you, the experts!

We just purchased a short sale house that was empty for 14 months. There's 100 feet of neglected ficus hedge that has grown to approx. 15' high. I've cleared out the dead wood in the middle, and cleaned out the vines and other plants that grew up in the middle of the hedge.

I'd like to hard prune the hedge back to a 8' tall privacy hedge. I'm wondering if I can simply cut it back to 6 or 7 feet tall, water/fertilize and have it fill in and grow back to 8'? If so, when is the best time to do that? I'm in Zone 10 (South Florida), so there's plenty of sun even now.

If it won't come back, we could always slowly remove the ficus and replant with something else that's lower maintenance. Just wanted to give it a shot. Thanks for the input in advance!