In an attempt to be thorough and have my hopeful flaw identified I'll share the whole history of this plant. My father in law gave my wife and I this schefflera he started from the trimmings of his office plant. I have been trying to get it to grow for a year now with little success. For the first 2-3 months I had it in moderate afternoon sun light via a NW facing window. The leaves gradually turned black and dropped, and it would not put off new growth. Thinking it needed more light, I put a small lamp over it. I had it that way for 6-8 weeks with no change. I then moved to the living room with very little natural light, and I placed the lamp on it. It perked up and started putting off new leaves. I've had it there for 6 months or so and each new leaf is progressively smaller (see pics). The latest doesn't even have a full set of 5 leaflets (see pics). Google tells me it needs more sunlight, which would be counter intuitive to previous experience. But I moved it back to the NW window with the curtains drawn during the afternoon to prevent it from getting direct sun exposure. It has been there for about 5 days and the leaves are beginning to turn sideways (see pics).
I water when the top 1-1.5 inches of soil are dry. Usually about once every 2 weeks. Temperature in the house ranges between 72 and 75. Honestly, I'm not great with indoor plants so I'm at a loss. The goal for this plant is to get it to a point where I can trim it to begin encouraging it to branch. Right now I am struggling for respectable leaves. Anyone out there know their umbrella plants well enough to tell me what to do?
Thanks in advance for any input or advice.
Mike
