Crape Myrtle Mutiliation Returns

A harbinger of the New Year has unhappily but inevitably arrived. I was walking around the courthouse square the other day and spied my first glimpse of Crape Myrtle Mutilation. All those lovely trees had been whacked back nearly to the trunk in a January ritual that is as ugly as it is unnecessary. It happens all over the South. Perched on stepladders and armed with lops, landscapers happily hack away at these lovely trees, cutting the past year’s growth back. What remains are ungainly torsos. Most people apparently continue to believe that, for this loveliest of Southern ornamentals to bloom...

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