Crape myrtle

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Crape myrtle

Scientific classification

Kingdom:	Plantae
Division:	Magnoliophyta
Class:	Magnoliopsida
Order:	Myrtales
Family:	Lythraceae
Genus:	*Lagerstroemia*

Species

Lagerstroemia indica

The crape myrtle is of Chinese origin used as an ornamental. It has sinewy-looking fluted stems whose bark peels off; each year the parts peel off between those that peeled off last year, or where squirrels scratch it, giving a patchy appearance. The flowers have six or seven crinkly-edged petals on stalks, sticking out between the sepals, which are simple triangular points. The flowers occur in long (8-12 inch) spike-like clusters, and, depending on cultivar, they can be white, pink red, purple or lavender occurring , blooming from mid to late summer. The fruit is a capsule, green at first, then ripening to black, which opens along six or seven lines, producing teeth much like those of the calyx, and releasing twelve or fourteen small winged seeds.

L. indica, from China, the common crape myrtle, was introduced by French botanist Andre Michaux ca. 1790 in Charleston, South Carolina, where it is today a very common ornamental shrub raised and cultivated in South Central United States and is growing in popularity all over The United States.

L. speciosa, the giant crape myrtle from tropical India, is a tree, which is established only in the warmest parts of the US, such as Texas, Louisiana, Oklahoma, New Mexico, Arizona, California, Georgia, and surrounding states.

Both species are becoming more and more prevelant in the home owners landscape designs as well as commercial industries for businesses and municipalities along roadways, highways and byways. They both have become so common it is sometimes almost impossible to tell them apart without laboratory testing.

Crape myrtle Row in Winter
With Spanish moss
Johnsonville, South Carolina

Crape myrtle Blossoms
With Solitary Bee
Johnsonville, South Carolina