Re: Sweet Autumn Clematis

I would prune it.  If you don't, it eventually gets full of dead
material and looks pretty ratty.  Once it gets established, it can
easily grow 20 feet or more a year.  You will need to give it
something to climb on to the height you want it and in any direction
you want to head it - lattice or net or plastic fencing - something
it can get a grip on.  Once it reaches the top of whatever it is
climbing, it sort of billows out on itself.

I have not trained one horizontally, but expect you would need to
encourage it to go horizontally once it hit the eave of the garage
roof or it will just start up the roof (not great for shingles as it
will go under as well as over) or loop out into space.

You could probably get away with only pruning it hard every couple of
years.  I have a couple growing up big trees that I do not prune
because getting them back up to branch height is such a pain, and
seems to me it took at least a couple of years for them to amass a
sufficient amount of dead stuff to start looking really a bit tatty. 
You'd just have to see.

It will take 3 or 4 years from a small plant for this vine to really
hit its stride and want to cover the entire world in one season. 
Once it does...stand back:-)

Marge Talt, zone 7 Maryland
mtalt@hort.net
Editor:  Gardening in Shade
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----------
> From: Margot Kane <margotk@mindspring.com>
> I have a Sweet Autumn Clematis growing up my garage.  If I want it
to grow
> up to roof level and across the garage do I still prune it down to
ground
> level?
> 
> Thanks
> 
> Margot
> Zone 6/7

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