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Whatsit? Crepe Myrtle

Joylynn Hardesty

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Location: Due to winter mortality, I stubbornly state, zone 7a Tennessee

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posted 1 year ago

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Tree? Shrub? Dunno. Woody trunk, currently 6 feet tall with the bloom at the central leader. It must be a gift from the birdies! I bent the branches around to get details. It is growing upward, not naturally bending down.

'What we do now echoes in eternity.' Marcus Aurelius
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Jackson Bradley

pollinator

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Location: Zone 8A

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posted 1 year ago

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Looks like Crepe Myrtle to me!

"Condemnation by category is the lowest form of hatred for it is cold hearted and abstract, lacking the heat and even the courage of a personal hatred." -Wendell Berry

Judith Browning

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posted 1 year ago

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crepe myrtle?
It's almost a weed shrub here and will grow into a tree if pruned and new growth doesn't freeze.

I'm starting to appreciate them as shade and flowers.

"We're all just walking each other home." -Ram Dass
"Be a lamp, or a lifeboat, or a ladder."-Rumi
"It's all one song!" -Neil Young

greg mosser

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Location: the mountains of katuah, southern appalachia

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posted 1 year ago

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yep, crepe myrtle x3!

Joylynn Hardesty

master pollinator

Posts: 5508

Location: Due to winter mortality, I stubbornly state, zone 7a Tennessee

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posted 1 year ago

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Thanks guys! I would like to keep it under 10 feet tall. Any tips on pruning?

'What we do now echoes in eternity.' Marcus Aurelius
How Permies Works Dr. Redhawk's Epic Soil Series

May Lotito

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Location: Zone 6b

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posted 1 year ago

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I don't know crepe myrtle can grow from seed. A sizeable tree from Lowe's is sold for $30. You just save some money! It blooms from new wood so just cut it to the ground in late winter.

Zone 6, 45 inches precipitation, hard clay soil

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Jackson Bradley

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Location: Zone 8A

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posted 1 year ago

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Joylynn Hardesty wrote:Thanks guys! I would like to keep it under 10 feet tall. Any tips on pruning?

We do not have any of these but our neighbors on both sides of us do. I talked to both of them about their style of pruning. The one neighbor did light pruning until they could no longer reach from the ground and then did no pruning. Theirs are about 25'-30' tall and in front of their house. The sun is on it's way up on that side so the picture is not the best.

The other neighbor does a hard prune/topping in late winter/spring to about 5' high on all the branches. That makes it shorter and bushier. That one stays 7'-10' tall. He has 5 total and they are all in that height range.

If you want short and bushy, do a hard prune/topping to 5'. I think there could be some controversy around this style where folks say you are stressing/weakening/killing the tree with the hard prune. I am not sure about that because the hard prune neighbor has been hard pruning his since 2004. Hopefully you get a good range of opinions in the replies.

I think I like the tall ones best but would not like them next to my house like my one neighbor has them in the pic.

Hard-Prune.jpg

Light-no-prune.jpg

"Condemnation by category is the lowest form of hatred for it is cold hearted and abstract, lacking the heat and even the courage of a personal hatred." -Wendell Berry

Jackson Bradley

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posted 1 year ago

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I say hard prune/topping because I am not sure which term is correct as I have heard people interchange them when describing the crepe myrtle pruning.

"Condemnation by category is the lowest form of hatred for it is cold hearted and abstract, lacking the heat and even the courage of a personal hatred." -Wendell Berry

Judith Browning

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Location: a temperate, clay/loam spot on planet earth, the universe

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posted 1 year ago

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We see them pruned all sorts of ways here, including those Josh mentions....it's a really common landscape plant in the south.

They are very resilient so if how you prune doesn't work try another in a few years.

My favorite is chosing a very few of the trunks to grow larger, cut out all but a few, eventually just 3-5 so that they develope large gnarly trunks...then top those so that lots of new branches grow out the top and there will be a nice dome of flowers.

We had that look for a few years and then a big freeze froze things and they all grew back from the ground in a nice full bush shape...it's the easiest to maintain.

We have maybe six we 'play' with pruning and some fence line ones from bird droppings that are just starting to bloom.

My favorite is a deep red....too many pink ones.

an added thought ...didn't judson carroll just have something about crepe myrtle and it's medicinal properties? It was a video so I couldn't watch it.

"We're all just walking each other home." -Ram Dass
"Be a lamp, or a lifeboat, or a ladder."-Rumi
"It's all one song!" -Neil Young

Joylynn Hardesty

master pollinator

Posts: 5508

Location: Due to winter mortality, I stubbornly state, zone 7a Tennessee

2506

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posted 1 year ago

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Ooooh! Judson's YouTube on crepe myrtles. I missed that one

'What we do now echoes in eternity.' Marcus Aurelius
How Permies Works Dr. Redhawk's Epic Soil Series

Anne Miller

master steward

Posts: 19846

Location: USDA Zone 8a

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posted 1 year ago

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I loved my crepe myrtles that I left behind after various moves.

I would suggest making it a bush rather than a tree.

I love it as a bush.

Top it off at the height you prefer then encourage the sucker as shown in the photo above by Josh.

Invasive plants are Earth's way of insisting we notice her medicines. Stephen Herrod Buhner
Everyone learns what works by learning what doesn't work. Stephen Herrod Buhner

Jen Fulkerson

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Location: N. California

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posted 7 months ago

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Crepe myrtle can be great, or horrible depending on how you feel. My husband loves them, I'm not a fan. We have one in the yard, I've pruned it many times, but not in several years. We never water it, yet the picture was taken in the dead of summer. On the other hand I had one in the way of where I wanted to extend my rose garden. We cut it down and dug out all the trunk and roots we could find. This was many years ago. I have fought it ever since. It's my nemesis. So make sure you want it for ever where you plant it, because at least for me it's impossible to get rid of.

IMG20250720081107.jpg

“We can complain because rose bushes have thorns, or rejoice because thorn bushes have roses.” — Abraham Lincoln

Anne Miller

master steward

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Location: USDA Zone 8a

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posted 7 months ago

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My suggestion would be to not prune the crepe myrtle and let it be a bush.

I don't believe mother nature intended that to be a tree.

Invasive plants are Earth's way of insisting we notice her medicines. Stephen Herrod Buhner
Everyone learns what works by learning what doesn't work. Stephen Herrod Buhner

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