Ficus Uses

Ficus plants can be used in landscaping, to make latex and for food.Foliage image by Supertrooper from Fotolia.com

Ficus trees have many uses. A Ficus, or fig tree, can be grown and used in the home landscape to provide shade. The ficus, as a deciduous shrub, can work as a hedge, providing privacy by screening in the landscape, or as a food source, by growing edible fig fruit. This fig tree is even used to produce latex for cleaning dishes.

Food

Figs from the ficus can be eaten raw or whole, and are used in the making of cakes, pies, puddings and other bakery products. Figs also are used to create other edibles like jellies, jams and preserves. One popular American dessert cookie, Fig Newtons, contains fig paste. Fig paste is made by combining figs with ingredients such as corn flour, oils, syrup, wheat and whey.

Dried figs are made up of about 23 percent water and contain as much as 15 percent calcium. They are low in fat, and one dried fig has about 274 calories, according to the University of Georgia

Ficus trees are used as landscaping plants in the Caribbean and other places, as well as landscape trees and hedges in warm climates, such as Texas and the Gulf states. These fig trees can grow as tall as 30 feet.

According to "Landscape Plants", leaf color on the common fig tree can be dark green in color during the summer and then turn brown to black in the fall. No serious pest problems hinder the ficus' use as a landscape tree or hedge, but it should be planted in an area where falling fruit will not be a problem. This advice is especially important, considering this tree bears fruit twice a year.

The ficus produces a liquid-type latex, which is more plentiful in the early morning. This latex is used in tropical America for washing dishes, pans and pots. It used to be used in earlier household commercial detergents for the same purpose; however, its negative affect on the hands of housewives resulted in a discontinuation of it for that use in the United States, according to Purdue University.