The open plant encyclopedia
Snap a photo or search by any name to see how to care for it, where it comes from, whether it's safe, and a 3D model you can turn.
The plants people record most in your country, and ones that grow there wild.
Filter by what you want to do, shape, origin, country, care and safety.
Ficus benghalensis
Also called Banyan, Bengal Banyan, Bengal Fig, East Indian Figtree, Indian Fig Tree, Banyantree, Horn Fig
In Singapore: Indian Banyan, Banyan Tree, East Indian Fig Tree, Ara Banyan, Bayan (Grown in Singapore)
1 NParks heritage tree in Singapore: Found in Within Tiong Bahru Park
Indian banyan is a huge evergreen fig tree from the Indian subcontinent that starts life as an epiphyte and grows aerial roots that become new trunks, sometimes spreading very wide. It is grown as a large outdoor shade tree in warm climates, and only suits indoor life as a young bonsai or container specimen.
Ficus benghalensis, Ficus indica, or Ficus audrey commonly known as banyan, banyan fig, audrey fig and Indian banyan, is a tree native to the Indian subcontinent. The countries where it originated include Sri Lanka, Nepal, Pakistan, India, and East Himalaya. Specimens in India are among the largest trees in the world by canopy coverage. It is also known as a "strangler fig" because like many other trees in the genus Ficus it starts out as epiphyte, that is, leaning on another tree that it ends up enveloping.
In spite of being native solely to the Indian subcontinent, the tree has been cultivated in a variety of locations worldwide. For example, in East Asia it has been planted in Vietnam, Mayanmar and Laos, Queensland in Australia, Jamaica, and Trinidad-Tobago in the Caribbean, as well as Florida, USA. It has also flourished in Hawaii, but has not propagated beyond original cultivation due to the lack of the specific wasp required for its pollination. Since the inclusion of the wasp in Florida has caused invasiveness, there is a consensus that this wasp should not be brought to Hawaii.
Ficus annulata · Mosaic Fig · Ficus atricha · Florida strangler fig · Roxburgh fig · Weeping fig · Longleaf Fig · Ficus brachypoda · Fig · Ficus caulocarpa · Ficus celebensis · Creek Sandpaper Fig
[Contains information from Leaf Area Index (LAI) and Heritage Trees from data.gov.sg (National Parks Board), made available under the terms of the Singapore Open Data Licence version 1.0]
Text excerpted from the Wikipedia article Ficus benghalensis by its contributors, under CC BY-SA 4.0; the excerpts and the care summary drawn from them are shared under the same licence.
The care summary was written by AI (Claude, Anthropic) from the sources on this page, with general growing knowledge where they are silent. Check before relying on it.
Life form, climate and native range: World Checklist of Vascular Plants, Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew (CC BY 3.0), reformatted; see Plants of the World Online.
Pet safety from the ASPCA toxic and non-toxic plant lists.
