Unfortunately between moving and settling in, I never had a chance to amend the soil. This spring everything will get a dose of something.

This was last year's Mother's Day gift from one of my sons so it had to move too. Thanks Gardengal.

There is no such thing as a decently amended planting hole, the practice is fundamentally flawed. Always provide the same soil texture throughout the entire potential rooting area of the new plant. Do not plant in pockets of one soil (created through amending or replacement) with different soil around the outside. Provide a large area (extra wide hole, bed, berm or mound) of modified/replaced soil or plant in existing soil, without modification.

If plants have tiny roots systems, such as those produced by flowering annuals, bulbs or annual vegetables, then a small area of soil modification is adequate since the plants will not root into a very big area at all. For larger, longer-lived subjects such as evergreen clematis a much larger area will have to be amended to house its eventual root growth.

Then there is the problem of organic soil amendments decomposing and returning the soil to its original texture long before a persisting plant (such as a clematis) has finished with the site.

bboy, wonderful advice, when you think about it, it explains why so many things kick the bucket. I'll use your advice in future plantings.

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And that is why it is always recommended that a planting hole for clematis be very generously sized. And why one should continue to mulch with organic matter on a regular basis throughout the life of the vine.

There are very few absolutes in gardening.

The fundamentals behind amending of planting holes are basic and across-the-board. It's a simple matter of how movement of water is affected and how this affects the plants. The only variables that have been identified are due to how textures of existing soils affect the situation. Differing types and combinations of amendments do not change the result during organized experiments with controls - if you change the texture of a small area chances are pretty good movement of water into and out of that area will be affected and not in a productive way. Without controls (a duplicate set of matching plants without treatment) there is no way to establish that the treatment produced a superior result to lack of treatment. When amending of planting holes has been tested using control groups a repeated result is that the control groups grew better than those in the amended holes. This has been seen starting almost 40 years ago. So, when I was told to send everyone home with tie-in sales of soil amendments at garden centers I was working in 20 or 30 years ago the concept had already started to be seen to be bogus years beforehand.

A "big hole" for a clematis is not a departure from amending of individual planting holes, unless you are talking about a hole 5 or 10 feet across - which, of course, you are not. A 2-foot-wide hole is a small planting hole, that will receive water from surrounding soil if it is heavy and conditions are damp, and will shed it if surrounding soil is light and coarse and/or conditions are dry.

I've dug up too many plants sitting in a puddle and too many sitting in a pocket of dust with moist soil all around to have much doubt in the consistency of the factors described by those who have done the research.

I grow about 20 different clematis, the only one I killed twice was Armandi, I planted it in the same area twice, and after a couple of years of doing well they just up and died. I did mulch with compost but I can see now it should have had more root room. The space was very narrow. Lesson learned. I replanted it again last year in a much better way, it should do well, you guys must have been looking over my shoulder.

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I believe my second Armandii is on it's way out....

This one is 'Appleblossom' the first was the more common white one.

I have over 35 other Clemmies doing very well.

This clematis was a little pricey so I hope I have better luck than some of you.

I do have to move it again, poor thing. LOL I plopped a lot of stuff in the garden last fall just so they'd be planted. Still have quite a few things to do and move before this garden feels like mine.

We have had a terrible winter and my armandi Apple blossom, which was planted last year has snapped off completely from the top of the root. which means the two biggest stems bearing the whole plant has broken. My question is...will the main root send new shoots in the Spring or should I not hope for this at all?

I would like to know which evergreen clematis, Apple Blossom or Snow Drift would give me a more compact coverage. The round leaves on the Apple Blossom look to me like it may be more dense.

The ONLY difference between the two cultivars is flower color - the leaves and growth habit are exactly the same. And neither one is what I would call "compact" :-))