Wow, that is a serious whacking!

Cruel but at the same time kind treatment. You should see regrowth in no time. Looks like a soaker hose in use there. You can tell it must be the PNW since there is no mulch on the ground on top of it. Those plants would be goners here in the south. They would fry in no time without mulch!! ;O

Yes, those are soaker hoses and they are on top of mulch. I use composted yard debris that we buy by the truckload. It looks like nice rich dirt but my dirt is really red clay. You can see the neighbor's fir tree needles all over too. They drop constantly. Some got brushed off though when DH pulled the old net down.

These Clems are behind our fish pond. I have 7 Clems on nylon netting behind the pond. Sadly, 4 of them were not whacked at first and they are who I learned my lesson on.

I'm sure I'll see regrowth in no time. I'm not worried but you should have seen the look on my husband's face when I did it. He is used to me yelling "watch out for the Clemmie"

I posted it to put my money where my mouth is since I keep telling others to hard prune.

Helsingborg is an Alpina, Type I and Josephine is a Type II. Both were planted last summer.

These flowers were 3'-4' up the vine when I took the pic earlier this year. Josephine was over 6'.

{{gwi:603256}}

The proof is in the whacking and the picture!

I cut one of my clematis off at the ground last year in the heat of summer and it promptly jumped back up and bloomed. I no longer fear my clematis...

Carol

Just wanted to say that the bare stems in the first picture are sprouting at least 2 stems at every node. I saw some with 3. Some are an inch long already. I was hoping for more from the buried crown but none have appeared. I threw on a couple inches of composted manure yesterday. Hoping that might help.