Title image above is copyright © Kristi Ellinopoullos
First published 22nd November 2025
Some time around winter 2025 (I stupidly didn’t take notes) I uprooted a self-seeded sandpaper fig (there are several species buit this one is most likely to be Ficus coronata), took a bunch of cuttings, and placed the remainder into this used 4.1 L Air-Pot seed tray. As with the silk floss tree cutting, this was a used one ready to go, otherwise I would have used the very similar 4.1 L bonsai training pot instead.
I liked the butressing already developing, and the thin side branch lower down on the trunk:
copyright © Kristi Ellinopoullos
New leaves were growing by late September (this photo was taken on 4th October 2025):
copyright © Kristi Ellinopoullos
But it was beneath the surface that the real magic was taking place, as this root-reveal photo shows!
copyright © Kristi Ellinopoullos
Using this particular Air-Pot — one of my first and many years’ old now — allows me to show just how tough and great quality these are. It takes many years and many screwing-unscrewing cycles of the fixture for the slightest bit of damage to ever appear. Here, a small fracture has developed on this cone where the fixture inserts. This really is insignificant and has no bearing on performance whatsoever. If that hole ever becomes unuseable down the track however, I would simply use another cone,
copyright © Kristi Ellinopoullos
copyright © Kristi Ellinopoullos
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1 Comment(s)
Hi Kristi,
Just wondering what success you had using airpots to thicken up plants?
Thanks!
Hi Josh, what a great question! Is this in the context of bonsai?
I don't consciously focus on the trunk, but on giving the roots a great environment. The trunks then just naturally get thicker in an Air-Pot - regular ones and the bonsai training pots - once a well-fertilised well-watered root ball has become established.
Your comment is incredibly timely I must say - uncannily timely - as literally just two days ago, same day but some hours before you wrote your comment, I pulled out this tree from about a year ago for a look: here
and what I saw made me on the spot want to write a follow-up - which kinda sorta involves thickened trunks :) Unfortunately that may be a few days away as there's a lot going on right now sorry. I'll keep you posted - but let's just say the trunk was *very* noticeably thicker!
Best regards,
Kristi
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