are they zone appropriate for nebraska????

if not.. why bother ...

ken

Far better to purchase plant products when you arrive there. They have a better chance at being adapted. And I've never heard of CM being NE tolerant. Are there new vars that are??

Dan

There are a few crape myrtle cultivars that would be marginally hardy (dieback shrubs) in some of the warmer areas given proper conditions. Sarah's Favorite has been reported hardy to zone 5b (-12 degrees F) and the Filli series can supposedly survive in zone 4.

They really need to be outdoors in the sunshine! And humidity. Sorry.

when I went to the nursery to look, I saw a few varieties that said they were hardy down to 5° F, it can get a little colder than that in NE, but I thought I would still try. Maybe if I mulch it really good and keep it in a protected area, it will have a better chance. Worst case, it doesnt make it through the winter. I will see if there's some place I can keep it outside (we live in apartments) until the move, or I will just wait and hope the nursery still has some good ones left.

There's another forum I frequent where someone in nebraska has a CM or has seen them there and says that they are perennials that die back to the ground much like they do even farther south in zone 7 and 8 with varieties that aren't that hardy. There is someone here in new england i believe that has a zumi (is it?) c.m. that has grown successfully. So I wouldn't rule it out but don't bet on it being a prized specimen. There are some things we just have to try and see for ourselves what will and wont work.

Oh but there is something I can tell you for sure. Moving with plants is a real schlep. It's a stressful time. Moving from NC to NE. I can imagine moving van and vehicles stuffed to capacity. $3+ gas. Moving the plants may end up costing a great deal of money and once you get there you're going to have to remember to water and care for them while you're trying to get settled and all of that.

Just mail order some when you get there if none of the local nurseries have them.

I'm zone 6 StLouis and "Dynamite" is not really hardy here despite what the box stores claimed. Fella dies back quite a bit every year. Perhaps if I build an extension onto my house around it and run my dryer vent so it blows warm air on the shrub.

"Perhaps if I build an extension onto my house around it and run my dryer vent so it blows warm air on the shrub."

ROFL, yeah right.

musicalperson-- yeah, I'm not completely counting on it growing to be 20 ft tall or even surviving at all, I just want to try and see. I'm definitely going to stick with a variety that at least claims to withstand colder temps (possibly "Red Rocket" or "Tuscarora"). I lived in South Dakota (where pretty much nothing grows...jk) for 22 years but have spent the last year in NC and kinda got attached to some of the beautiful plants here. As for moving, my husband is ending his active duty in the Marine Corps, so the military is paying for our move back to NE. That and I already have about a dozen houseplants I moved here from SD that will be needing to come along too, so one more probably won't hurt too much :). Thanks to everyone for all the advise!

of all the things that will be requisite on moving a household ... i really dont see where this idea makes your life any more easy ....

will it be in your lap for the entire drive.. for your flight ...

i would mail order one after i get the house in shape.. for proper fall planting.. rather than complicate my life in moving...

but you do whatever makes you happy

good luck

ken

You may be able to grow lilacs there. A lot of people in the south try to grow lilacs and fail but CM is sort of like the lilac of the south. So you aren't going to be totally without options there. It's not like it's in the north pole.

I overwintered 5 CM's in my family room at around 40 degrees all winter. They were just barely beginning to break bud in early April when it was warm enough to put them out in the greenhouse. Kept them barely watered during the winter. They look really great now, except for a bit of tip burn on the newest leaves from the morning the windchill was 24.

But, I certainly wouldn't buy one and bother moving with it. The sell oodles of these things mail order every year, and you can get them really cheap on ebay. I'd just wait and get one later, even if you have to wait until next spring.

Not really worth doing as a dieback plant in the north unless you like the foliage. Mine almost NEVER open a flower -- they bud up late in the season, just in time for the flower buds to get whacked by the first fall frosts.

Well now if you keep your home the temperature of a meat locker, then that is another story. Some mail order houses do that to keep things dormant.

"I overwintered 5 CM's in my family room at around 40 degrees all winter."

I never knew you lived in an igloo! (-:

Who told you that a Tuscarora Crepe Myrtle would survive in Nebraska?

Very young Tuscarora Crepe Myrtles easily suffer a lot of winter kill in the South Central Plains 6b/7a zone areas.

It is true that once their trunks grow to about 1 1/2 inches thick and when their roots have become well established they seem to stop experiencing winter kill of the trunks, but it seems like in Nebraska, you would almost need to winter protect, not only the planting bed, but also the dormant trunks. I mean for at least as long as it takes for any newly planted crepe Myrltes to become well established and for the trunks to gain that kind of thickness.

In NE OK's zone 6b/7a winters nearly all our Crepe Myrtles go dormant just like our other deciduous shrubs and trees and they do not leaf out again until the middle of May. Then, depending on the cultivar, they will begin blooming by June or July and keep reblooming until our first early winter frost. None of our Crepe Myrtles that truely die during the winter come back. Instead their branches just become dried out and brittle, and no new suckers grow from the root system to form new trunks. That is, unless the roots have been well established for at least a few years of growing season activity, before the winter kill of all its trunks occured.

I have noticed, that in our USDA zone, the Tuskogee Crepe Myrtles have displayed no winter kill in their trunks the first winter they experince after the first growing season, not even when those trunks are fairly thin.

There may be other Crepe Myrtle cultivars just as resistant to trunk death during harder winter conditions, but the Tuscarora certainly does not seem as if it would be one of the best of that grouping. I mean at least during the first years after its first planting when its trunks are still very thin and its roots are not yet well established.

No one told me either of the varieties I mentioned would grow in NE, the nursery tags on them just said that they were more resistant to lower temperatures. But I'll keep it in mind that Tuscarora doesn't do as well.

I was planning on mulching around the base of the plant for at least the first few winters. Also, the area I plan on planting it is fairly protected without being shaded, near our house. The plants I'm looking at to eventually buy are smallish but not tiny, I'd say their trunks are around 1" diameter. I'll be able to plant my CM in early July, so it will have at least half a summer to get some roots growing. Its okay with me if it dies back close to the base, my husband doesn't want it to grow too tall anyway.

This is just an experiment. If my Crepe Myrtle dies, yeah, I'll be a little disappointed, but I bet the world will keep turning, ha. Thanks again to everyone for all the advise, I'll take as much information as I can get!

Well if you go planting in july, it may not succeed for an entirely different reason. Don't set yourself up for failure. Make a call to your future home's agriculture extension office and see what flowering shrubs are proven for your area. Ask them what are ideal planting times. They may be able to tell you more about crepe myrtles or substitutes for them.

For more reliable info about your choice, you might should use the correct (more widely accepted, anyway) spelling. Almost all knowledgeable/reliable sources will spell crape with an "a". The Crape Myrtle Society, almost all university and educational sources, as well as almost all botanical gardens and arboretums spell it with an "a". Using the "e"-spelling may turn up less-reliable/less-informed sources. Sometimes just one letter can make a big difference in a Google search.

I purposely spell it wrong to annoy brandon. ;-)
And the Crepe Myrtle Society.

True enough. Crape Myrtle is the official spelling, and does pull-up better websites, but there are so many who would rather spell it Crepe Myrtle, that the issue almost becomes a mute point. That is except for researchers and other such experts like retail and wholesale plant brokers.

Actually if you really want to spell it right, it's crapemyrtle. No space.

Musicalperson,
Maybe you're right, but the vast majority of experts disagree. I bet Gardengal would spell it like me. Maybe you ought to ask her. ROFLMBO