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Wednesday - March 25, 2015

From: Kernersville, NC
Region: Southeast
Topic: Shrubs
Title: Does Wax Myrtle Have a Taproot?
Answered by: Anne Van Nest

QUESTION:

Does a wax myrtle have a taproot?

ANSWER:

Wax myrtle (Morella cerifera) is a wispy, 6-12 ft., multi-trunked, evergreen shrub, southern bayberry or wax myrtle can reach 20 ft. in height. The light olive-green foliage has a spicy fragrance. Pale blue berries occur on female plants in the winter. Handsome gray bark is almost white on some plants. It serves as an excellent screen plant, with both standard and dwarf varieties available. Because there are separate male and female plants, if you want berries you must have male plants close enough to the berry-producing female plants for pollination to occur. The leaves are aromatic, with an appealing, piquant fragrance when crushed. Colonists separated the fruits waxy covering in boiling water to make fragrant-burning candles, a custom still followed in some countries.

The USDA factsheet on wax myrtle says that this plant is easy to transplant bare root which suggests that it is not have much of a taproot (if any). Also wax myrtle spreads by sending up suckers from the roots and has been frequently used as a bonsai plant (more evidence that it has a fibrous root system).

From the Image Gallery

Wax myrtle
Morella cerifera