What is the Strangler Fig?

Strangler Figs come from a hostile, barren environment such as forests and rainforests. The fruits and foliage that make such places a paradise for so many animals, make it a dark, dry world for a young plant. Their own elders and other competitors take all the light from the sky and moisture from the ground. It’s a world of dead man’s boots, or dead tree’s roots, where the young must wait for the old to die before they can compete to take their place. The host tree begins to suffer as less and fewer nutrients from the soil can make it up to the leaves, the pathways blocked and crushed by the Strangler. More and more nutrients are left in the ground, to be taken up by those same, deadly roots. On the other side, the Strangler Fig continues to grow upwards to the light and steals it away from the host. This young plant now grows, both up to the Sun and down to the ground. Roots descend all the way to terra firma, like a weird inverse of a borehole. But the Strangler Fig will not be satisfied with supping moisture through a few straws. Innocuous and harmless before now, the lodger begins to unveil its true intentions. Some Strangler Figs can reach some 45 meters in height and live for hundreds of years. With their dark past behind them, they become important, contributing members of society; their fruits are eaten by huge numbers of animals in the forest and many depend on them.

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