In figs of this group, seed germination usually takes place in the canopy of a host tree with the seedling living as an epiphyte until its roots establish contact with the ground.

The tree provides habitat, food and shelter for a host of tropical lifeforms including epiphytes in cloud forests and birds, mammals, reptiles and invertebrates.

[10] Thomas Nuttall described the species in the second volume of his 1846 work The North American Sylva[11] with specific epithet aurea ('golden' in Latin).

[12] In 1768, Scottish botanist Philip Miller described Ficus maxima, citing Carl Linnaeus' Hortus Cliffortianus (1738) and Hans Sloane's Catalogus plantarum quæ in insula Jamaica (1696).

Sloane's illustration of the species, published in 1725, depicted it with figs borne singly, a characteristic of the Ficus subgenus Pharmacosycea.

Berg located the plant collection upon which Sloane's illustration was based and concluded that Miller's F. maxima was, in fact, F.

[2] In 1920, American botanist Paul C. Standley described three new species based on collections from Panama and Costa Rica—Ficus tuerckheimii, F. isophlebia and F.

"[5] Thirty years earlier, William Burger had come to a very different conclusion with respect to Ficus tuerckheimii, F. isophlebia and F. jimenezii—he rejected DeWolf's synonymisation of these three species as based on incomplete evidence.

Burger noted that the three taxa occupied different habitats which could be separated in terms of rainfall and elevation.

This fact is important for fig wasps—female wasps need to find a syconium in which to lay their eggs within a few days of emergence, something that would not be possible if all the trees in a population flowered and fruited at the same time.

Newly emerged female wasps must move away from their natal tree in order to find figs in which to lay their eggs.

[21] As a hemiepiphyte it germinates in the canopy of a host tree and begins life as an epiphyte before growing roots down to the ground.

Palms, which lack secondary growth, are not affected by this, but they can still be harmed by competition for light, water and nutrients.

[23] Ficus aurea ranges from Florida, across the northern Caribbean to Mexico, and south across Central America.

It is present in central and southern Florida and the Florida Keys,[24] The Bahamas, the Caicos Islands, Hispaniola, Cuba, Jamaica, the Cayman Islands, San Andrés (a Colombian possession in the western Caribbean),[5] southern Mexico,[25] Belize, Guatemala, Honduras, Nicaragua, El Salvador, Costa Rica and Panama.

[20] In The Bahamas, F. aurea is found in tropical dry forests on North Andros,[32] Great Exuma[27] and Bimini.

However, in dry forests on Great Exuma in The Bahamas, F. aurea establishes exclusively on palms, in spite of the presence of several other large trees that should provide suitable hosts.

Eric Swagel and colleagues attributed this to the fact that humus accumulates on the leaf bases of these palms and provides a relatively moist microclimate in a dry environment, facilitating seedling survival.

[27] Figs are sometimes considered to be potential keystone species in communities of fruit-eating animals because of their asynchronous fruiting patterns.

[36] In the Florida Keys, F. aurea is one of five fruit species that dominate the diet fed by white-crowned pigeons to their nestlings.

[37] F. aurea is also important in the diet of mammalian frugivores—both fruit and young leaves are consumed by black howler monkeys in Belize.

In addition to its pollinators (Pegoscapus mexicanus), F. aurea is exploited by a group of non-pollinating chalcidoid wasps whose larvae develop in its figs.

[41] Mites: belonging to the family Tarsonemidae (Acarina) have been recognized in the syconia of F. aurea and F. citrifolia, but they have not been identified even to genus, and their behavior is undescribed.

The oldest example dates back to 75 CE and was found in a shaft tomb culture site in Huitzilapa, Jalisco in Mexico.

[51] Individual F. aurea trees are common on dairy farms in La Cruz, Cañitas and Santa Elena in Costa Rica, since they are often spared when forest is converted to pasture.

[8] However, it was considered a useful tree for "enviroscaping" to conserve energy in south Florida, since it is "not as aggressive as many exotic fig species," although it must be given enough space.