Big crepe myrtle..... it pays to chat up your hobby

Joe Dupre'

Omono
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Location
Belle Rose, La.
USDA Zone
9a
Talking plants with my brother-in-law, he said he had a crepe myrtle he needed to be gone. "I'll be glad to take that off your hands. No charge." Ha! Took most of an hour to dig it up. It had a 4" tap root to cut. Surprisingly hard wood. Not a whole lot of feeder roots, but crepes are pretty resilient, so it should be alright.

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I've always wanted to take one of these and create a twin trunk, I think it's been done often with bald cypress. So many options

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I've always wanted to take one of these and create a twin trunk, I think it's been done often with bald cypress. So many options

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Yes, I considered that idea too. I've done a few cypresses that way. The all-important first flush will let me know what course I'll take.
 
A little update. Two 1/16" nubs have sprouted, so it looks like it lives. I'll be 69 next month, so I hope I'm kicking long enough to see it look like a bonsai.
 
Another update. She's taking off. There's a lot of sprouting from the base/roots that I had to slow down by pinching the growing tips. That little clump was wanting to be a shohin! Trying to redirect the growth to the sprouts further up the trunk.

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Another update. She's taking off. There's a lot of sprouting from the base/roots that I had to slow down by pinching the growing tips. That little clump was wanting to be a shohin! Trying to redirect the growth to the sprouts further up the trunk.

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Isn't it sort of early to be controlling the growth at this time? I always thought...one wants all new growth early on.
 
Isn't it sort of early to be controlling the growth at this time? I always thought...one wants all new growth early on.
This is something @rockm told me about.
I was always plucking low shoots/suckers off of newly collected material in hopes that the plant wouldn’t ditch the upper portion of the plant.
This I learned isn’t quit the right procedure.
 
Isn't it sort of early to be controlling the growth at this time? I always thought...one wants all new growth early on.
Yes..... normally. I go a bit by feel in situations like this. The bottom growth was really taking off and I felt it was taking energy from the shoots I wanted to grow. I didn't cut the bottom growth off, just pinched the tips to hopefully encourage more top growth. Scientific proof? None. A hunch from growing 35 different species? Yep.
 
Yes..... normally. I go a bit by feel in situations like this. The bottom growth was really taking off and I felt it was taking energy from the shoots I wanted to grow. I didn't cut the bottom growth off, just pinched the tips to hopefully encourage more top growth. Scientific proof? None. A hunch from growing 35 different species? Yep.
The last time I had a big crepe myrtle in a bonsai pot similar to yours, I cut all the bottom growth off and the tree died. The growth on the top alone wasn't sufficient to regrow the roots. I think you are doing the right thing by just gently pointing it the other way.
 
The last time I had a big crepe myrtle in a bonsai pot similar to yours, I cut all the bottom growth off and the tree died. The growth on the top alone wasn't sufficient to regrow the roots. I think you are doing the right thing by just gently pointing it the other way.
I'm counting on the auxin, or lack thereof, to redirect the growth where I want it. The foliage on the bottom is still contributing to replacing nutrients in the tree and helping to grow new roots. There were almost no small feeder roots, so I'm preceding with as much caution as I can muster.
 
Update- 5 months from collection. She's growing so fast, I've pruned off twice as much as you see here just to keep the branches from breaking in the wind. I cut the leader back a month or so ago because it was over 3 feet tall and seemed to be exerting too much leverage at its base. I put in a piece of aluminum wire to hold up the leader in case the kamikaze birds land on the canopy. I'll have to unroll a bit more as the tree has grown a bit. I let a branch extend from the base for a future approach graft attempt. All branches have secondary branching, some have tertiary branching and two have quaternary branching (new word for me). There's even a bunch of flower buds in the apex. Soil is approx. 60-70 % organic.

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If you plan on using that leader as your next trunk and need the girth, you could stake it to prevent breakage due to wind. That’s what I did with my liquidambar. I used a 5/8” rod that Lowe’s sells for their prefabricated metal fences. It flexes a little with the wind which helps build girth below. But prevented the whip from braking.

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I'm a big fan of how muscular that thing looks. Reminds me of hornbeam!
 
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