Sharon's blog: My crape myrtle story

Craziest thing, this little plant, and I'm such a sucker for crazy plant stories, but here is a winner.

In the fall of 2008, I cut a piece off a neighbor's crape myrtle bush, brought it home, rinsed it off and dabbed a bit of cinnamon to its cut end. It was October and I stuck the little 6 or so inch cutting in the corner of a daylily bed, one close to my glass doors so I could watch it.  Not much to watch in October, but I knew by spring I'd know if it lived or died.

The following January '09 we ended the month with a historical ice storm that led to electricity-less days that numbered in the double digits for me. Limbs were all over all my entire yard and there was some doubt about the trees that were left standing. I paid little attention to my garden beds that year; I was too busy cleaning up and repairing all the damage.

The past two years have been pretty mundane, a little drought ridden and unusually hot, but tolerable. I noticed something growing slightly at the corner of the daylily bed and remembered sticking some strange little thing in the ground there, but time sometimes erases all those little memories and I'm apt to plant anything anywhere anytime.

This year has been a bit unusual in that things started greening and blooming very early and in March that little thing in the corner started reaching out in all directions, grabbing my legs as I walked by. I didn't really remember what it was but knew I'd planted it so I thought I'd wait and see. It did get a little pruning at that time, just enough to keep it away from my legs.

Time passed, the heat and drought happened and on the first of August I had few if any blooms. Two days ago, that little less than 2 feet tall thing on the corner of the daylily bed grabbed my legs again. I looked a little closer. Buds!  What on earth.

In this land of brown crunchies, nothing is popping into bloom, and I mean nothing. I do have Ethan's sunflowers and I did have LarryR's Amana banana canna that thought it might bloom but changed its mind when it was met with another 100 degree day. But here it was, buds, tons of them on the little bush on the corner. It bloomed yesterday, magenta colored blooms, just a few of them in clusters. Crape myrtle? Sure looked like it.

I'm not known for my excellent note keeping usually, but I glanced back at the few words I'd written in an old garden diary after Vic positively id'ed the plant as crape myrtle. "October 19, 2008, 6 inches of crepe myrtle from Sam's yard to corner of deck daylily bed. Cinnamon."

Notice I spelled crape myrtle with the old spelling in that diary. Doesn't matter a bit because it has suddenly sprung to life right in the corner of my mostly dead daylily bed. This summer has been filled with surprises.  Now I get to learn everything about an entirely new-to-me plant.

Amazing how beautiful things just happen.

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