We are in the midst of fall clean-up in the front garden - it is a mess out there at the moment! It is very dry (only 36mm/1.4") of rain in Sept. - less than 1/2 our usual Sept. rain...) We did a severe cut-back/prune on the Chinese wisteria as it was encroaching on/blocking passage on the path behind it. I planned the cut-back for at least a year but we never got around to it until this week! The mulch that was put on the path this spring has already broken down so I'll be thinking over the winter about whether that needs re-doing in spring... In the clean-up/wisteria pruning we found and removed one root sucker on the Chinese wisteria - that was the first root sucker we had seen on it for at least 5 years. The Japanese wisteria, in contrast, produces several root suckers every year! Garden chores are endless but so is our interest/pleasure in the garden :-) And while they are a constant source of work, we do love the wisterias, particularly the Chinese one (which we planted in 2001) Some pictures...:

Chinese wisteria viewed from the road today after yesterday's pruning to (a) lift the 'skirt' (b) distance from the hydrangea (to the left of it and not showing in this picture) and (c) stop it from encroaching on the path behind it.

Rear view with the path showing:

What it looked like on May 24 this year when the wisteria was just starting to leaf out (note that this year was a bad bloom year for the wisteria!) You can clearly see how much it encroached on the path.

For comparison - spring last year was a much better bloom year!