My husband went to visit an old friend of his today. He has a fig tree potted in a huge planter. He's had it there for 10+ years. Who knew? I don't think he's repotted it in at least 5 yrs from what he can remember . It didn't look like a healthy tree. My hubby said the branches were kind of gnarly looking with leaves only at the tips of the branches. When he inspected it, it seemed like the trunk and most of the branches were covered in white thin lines - hundreds and hundreds. When he looked under a magnifying glass , he said it was definitely a sucker type bug. Head of it sunk into bark and a tiny white body no more that 1-2 mm.  It had lots of figs on it. Because it had figs , he didn't even notice the gnarly branches I guess. I don't think his eye site is that good anymore.
They went and got an insecticidal soap and sprayed it well. He'll do it again tomorrow too.
His wife gave him that tree and she's passed now - so he was beside himself.
Anyone have any ideas how to to save this tree?  He wants to try and save it.
Thanks for any ideas you might have.

See if you can make air layers of the current living green stuff.  Take a few cuttings and root them.  And do what you are doing to save the actual tree.  It will go dormant, and at that time can be root and top pruned and get a new bunch of fresh dirt in which to live..
Suzi

Continue insecticidal soap treatment for the remainder of the growing season.  Before the tree gets put away for the winter, spray w/dormant oil and again ever couple of weeks while it is in storage.  Then repot and root prune the tree just before it breaks dormancy in the spring.  My guess is if top growth is already stunted, the only top pruning you will need to do is to remove dead/damaged limbs and to shape.

The way you described the tree, I would expect the root ball to pretty compacted and difficult to work through.  Give yourself plenty of time to get the job done.  Also, have a hose with a sprayer near by to wet the roots down from time to time.  Once all the growing mix is pulled off the roots, cut away several of the thickest roots. The remaining roots cut back to about 2" shorter than than the radius of an appropriate sized pot, then replant.

The tree might be a little bit slow coming out of dormancy, but it will rebound.
~james

Suzi and James , thanks so much . It was pretty much what my hubby and I had  discussed . As we are really just learning about fig trees - we didn't want to suggest anything that might be detrimental. We both need a lot more hands on experience with figs.