Arapaho Crape Myrtle for Sale - Buying & Growing Guide

Planting and Care

by Mary Van Keuren | Gardener (30+ Years Experience) – last update on July 5, 2022

Planting instructions

Site your crape myrtle where it will get bountiful sun for at least six hours a day, in soil that drains well. Unpot your sapling and tease out any encircling roots, which can girdle your tree and slowly kill it. Dig a hole that’s as deep as the root ball and twice as wide. Place the plant in the hole, spreading out the roots. Fill in around the root ball with topsoil, tamping down as you go to eliminate air pockets. Water thoroughly. Apply a 2- to 3-inch layer of an organic mulch, such as bark chips, around the root zone to conserve water and hinder weed growth.

Watering and nutrients

Water every few days when first planted, until you see robust new growth starting to appear. Then cut back to once-a-week watering for the remainder of the first year. A mature crape myrtle won’t need a great deal of supplemental watering unless the weather is very hot or dry. Check the soil 2 inches below the surface; if it is dry, give your plant a drink. Feed your Arapaho crape myrtle in spring with a high-nitrogen fertilizer such as a 20-10-10 formulation. Use a slow-release formula, and avoid over-fertilizing, which may inhibit blooms.

Pollination

The Arapaho crape myrtle is a hybrid — it was created by the U.S. National Arboretum in the 1980s as they searched for a crape myrtle that would be resistant to powdery mildew. This means it does not come true to seed and must be propagated by cuttings. Despite this, the flowers of this crape myrtle are very attractive to pollinators, and especially bees of many kinds.

Pruning

Your Arapaho crape myrtle can be left unpruned, except for broken, diseased, or damaged limbs, in which case it will become a roughly vase-shaped bush. Most gardeners, however, prune out all but four or five of the strongest trunks, as well as any suckers at the base of the trunks, so that it assumes the form of a mid-sized tree. It can be pruned severely for size in late winter, but this can lead to awkward pollarded growth at the top of the tree that is susceptible to disease and pests.

Pests and diseases

Pests of the Arapaho crape myrtle include crape myrtle aphids, which can be handled by releasing predatory insects, such as ladybugs and Japanese beetles, which can be picked off by hand or controlled by placing a trap about 50 feet away from the tree. Milky spore can also be used to eliminate these insects. Arapaho crape myrtles are resistant to powdery mildew, which is the most common disease of crape myrtles. They may also experience cercospora leaf spot, though it isn’t common.

Achieving maximum results

With many ornamental trees, there are established methods of pruning. Not so the crape myrtle. In fact, you may hear gardeners talk about “crape murder” when they see a tree that has been lopped off at the top. So let’s start with what you should definitely do when you have a crape myrtle: monitor the tree for branches that are broken or diseased or that have died, and trim these back to an adjoining branch whenever you see them. After that, how you prune your crape myrtle is based partly on whether you want a tree or a bush to fill the spot. Left unpruned, they will grow tall and bushy, and can be used as a privacy screen or hedge. If you prefer, you can prune out some, but not all, of the main trunk-like branches, which will lead the plant to grow into a 15- to 25-foot specimen tree. You can also grow your crape myrtle into a single-trunk tree by trimming out all but the most sturdy trunk. Be wary of trimming back the height of your tree. Trim lightly, cutting out no more than one-third of the top growth per year, so you cannot be accused of “crape murder.”

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