Hi Caitlin. Ficus altissima will unfurl small miniature leaves and then these can slowly grow into really big leaves (appropriate for the size of the plant). Their leaf size is not fixed at unfurling. :)

Thank you Tom! I am very Curious to see how big these mini leaves become. One has already grown quite a bit in the last two days! Its incredible to see the resilience of plants :).

When you truncated/pinched the main stem, you removed the apex or the growing tip of the stem where an important growth regulator (auxin) is primarily produced. In doing that, another growth regulator, which stimulates lateral (side) growth, became dominant, the result of which are the new branches you see forming in the crotch (axil) of each leaf. As the branches of plants in the mulberry family (Ficus is one of those genera) extend, the leaves will be increasingly larger at maturity.

You can, at any time now, remove those large leaves by just snipping through the petiole (leaf stem). I recommend you do that asap. The reason is, thse extra leaves will provide too much food, and the internode length on the branches will be much longer than than they would be if you remove the 3 big leaves. The leaves on the new branches should emerge in pristine condition and perfectly adapted to the light level where the plant is sited.

Al

Thanks Al! I went ahead and cut them off. Wasn’t sure when the right time was so thank you for that advice!

That’s a good looking little tyke. I wish I was better at knowing more ficus plants so it did look familiar... I’m guessing some sort of bonsai simply because it looks like the trunk is expanding/splitting at the bottom of the picture... ficus microcarpa? feel free to correct me please. either way it looks like it’s ready to take off :)

That's just a cutting of a F retusa, Caitlin. I have dozens of Ficus trees as bonsai and growing on as bonsai candidates - more than 30 for sure. This one was built from the ground up from 5 tiny F benjaminas in a cup of soil, which I purchased at a big box store for $.79.

After I defoliated it:

Then pruned/wired it:

Have you seen this thread about Growing Ficus in Containers?

Al