When to trim Crepe Myrtle Charlotte

[nchunter]

Originally Posted by Native_Son

Pruning Crape Myrtles is a very silly "tradition".

I'd recommend against ever pruning them by "topping". They will produce many many more flowers if left uncut...

Absolutely! love the natural look of the trees! I never prune mine,just clean them up at the base.

[momtothree]

I came home to see all of our crepe myrtles all trimmed up at the base. My husband went ahead and cut off all the suckers leaving the main trunks clean. He left the canopy alone. I was all agog as I remembered this thread. Will they still bloom? They are still bare branches. We have about 7 of them in which he cleaned up.

(we had just moved here and everything was neglected overrun with weeds/grass/sucklings etc)

[The Native 1]

Originally Posted by momtothree

I came home to see all of our crepe myrtles all trimmed up at the base. My husband went ahead and cut off all the suckers leaving the main trunks clean. He left the canopy alone. I was all agog as I remembered this thread. Will they still bloom? They are still bare branches. We have about 7 of them in which he cleaned up.

(we had just moved here and everything was neglected overrun with weeds/grass/sucklings etc)

Hi, In the past few days since my original post the tree has bloomed a little. I say a little only because there was not much to bloom. My idiot yard guy cut away most of the smaller branches that were able to bloom. The good news is the tree is not dead but I have a feeling it would probably be another year or two before the smaller twigs are back enough to bloom effectively. You may find out the same is true for your tree.

[Native_Son]

Originally Posted by momtothree

I came home to see all of our crepe myrtles all trimmed up at the base. My husband went ahead and cut off all the suckers leaving the main trunks clean. He left the canopy alone. I was all agog as I remembered this thread. Will they still bloom? They are still bare branches. We have about 7 of them in which he cleaned up.

(we had just moved here and everything was neglected overrun with weeds/grass/sucklings etc)

You can safely clean the suckers from below the canopy to clean up the trunk. It shouldn't have any negative impact.

What I consider bad pruning is when they are topped, like pics...

[rocky37167]

No expert, but can only share what our service does. They top about 12-18" above the knuckle. They did this back in Feb i believe. We are only starting to get new growth. If they weren't crowded by other trees i'd probably leave them. in our case it seems to work. My service was adament about not cutting them to the knuckle. I've never used any fertilizer. Where they are located, we use black much. they seem to be doing ok.