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Friday, March 30, 2012

Crape myrtle, Crepe myrtle

Lagerstroemia indica (Crape myrtle, Crepe myrtle) is a species in the genus Lagerstroemiain the family Lythraceae. It comes in a variety of colours. Flowers are white, pink, mauve, purple or carmine with crimped petals, in panicles up to 9cm. 


Lagerstroemia indica is frost tolerant, prefers full sun and will grow to 6 metres with a spread of 6 metres.

Here are a few shrubs in flower up at "The Camp" at Wyangala.






From China, Korea and Japan, Lagerstroemia indica is an often multistemmed, deciduous tree with a wide spreading, flat topped, open habit when mature. The bark is a prominent feature being smooth, pinkinsh-gray and mottled, shedding each year. Leaves are small and dark green changing to yellow and orange in autumn.

Many hybrid cultivars have been developed between L. indica and L. faueri

Scientific classification
Kingdom:Plantae
Division:Magnoliophyta
Class:Magnoliopsida
Order:Myrtales
Family:Lythraceae
Genus:Lagerstroemia
Species:L. indica
Binomial name
Lagerstroemia indica
(L.Pers.


The "Dynamite" cultivar the Crepe Myrtle


2 comments:

Doc said...

Hi John,
I have a Crape Myrtle in the front garden variety name of 'Zuni', it always looks this time of year to be totally dead. But as the weather warms one can see that it is still thriving.

JohnD said...

Crape Myrtle are, of course, deciduous but your climate is very similar to the regions around us - warm summers, cool Autumns - probably with good 'leaf change colours' and the odd cold snaps during winter, so it should do well. We are further back from the coast (200klm) and around the 450-500 metre frost-level mark (get the occasional snowfall). I have a young tree in the backyard that was bought as a crape myrtle but each year it's looking more and more like a liquid amber () so I think I got sold a 'mis-labelled' tree but I'm letting it go on 'cos its the only tree that has managed to survive in a 'bad soil' spot.