Ask Burton!

This week, an interesting question about crapemyrtle color.

 

Q: My newly planted red crapemyrtle is starting to flower, and it’s pink and white, not red! Do I have the wrong type of crapemyrtle?

 

A: Not necessarily!

 

Thirty years ago, the entire nursery industry’s most common red crapemyrtle was a plant called ‘Watermelon Red’ – and it was in no way truly red. Then the National Arboretum as well as several commercial crapemyrtle breeders began to introduce new varieties that were truly red, as opposed to, “Well, if you look at it in partial shade, at the right time of day, it’s kind of red, we guess…”

 

This was a big improvement. But the new red types do have their own specific quirk. In almost all cases, the bloom is white while it’s in the bud. If a young plant is drought stressed at the exact moment the bloom is opening, color won’t flow properly into the opening flower in that crucial narrow window of time, leaving you an interesting look, like this! This can also happen if the plant is under excessive shade at that same moment of opening. (More than shade outside – more along the lines of having just spent two days in an eighteen-wheeler trailer in complete darkness.)

 

Just wait and keep the plant well-watered. This is a self-correcting issue.