clematis and chilean glory vine

My husband was the gardener but now I have to make the decisions so need help! I have a clematis which has large blue flowers. Some of the new shoots are now 4 inches long. How near to the ground do I have to prune it . Also the vine is very rampant. Do I leave it or cut it down?

 

All clematis are starting to sprout now. Do not touch the new growth, just prune back the old growth to healthy buds, then you can tie in the new growth as it develops.

 

Thanks. Any advice about the Chilean Glory Vine? Gwen Bragg

 

You can cut the vine if you need to Gwen it's quite resilient you usually get a lot of vinelets around it as it quite readily seeds itself.

 

Picking up a very old thread...because I want to ask about a Chilean Glory Vine - a red one. I bought seeds on ebay (of all places) 2 years ao. They were supposed to be Cobaea Alba - but at the time, I didn't know any better. I'd recognise them now - or at least, I'd know they weren't Cobaea.

Anyway: I germinated them and then in year 2 they started growing. I planted out in a spare space - but they didn't get enough water I think, to really show themselves. Still really lovely though. I took seed - and have planted up a few now. I am putting in some irrigation so hopefully the watering bit will be better this year. Interested to hear if anyone has any tips on these? Soil/sun etc? I've got a not too sunny spot where they would grow into a big old fig tree for eg? Thanks!

 

Eccremocarpus scaber grown it in Essex and Devon, once growing never really needed watering. Not fully hardy in Essex I lost it a couple of times in bad winters, but generally came back from below ground. Here in Devon it's pretty much evergreen and I hack it back a couple of times year. Pest free.
First met it in Lincolnshire in the late 70's where someone was growing it on a trellis to hide an oil tank used to get cut down to the ground every year by frost, but always came back as it had got down under the concrete slab the tank was on.

 

I've just sown some Eccremocarpus seeds, but I did grow it a long time ago .
It was perennial until I think a very bad winter in the late 80s, probably 1987,a really cold one.
I used to cut it back a bit to keep it tidy, but never did much else with it, can't remember watering it, although I probably did until it was established.

I think I saw you say your soil is pretty sandy @JimmyB so maybe some watering will be required.

 

Sounds perfect! I think that it is pretty rare that we get cold sufficient to impact anything in the ground in an enclosed garden. Not to say never of course. But rare. We shall see how my dahlia tubers get on this year: I’ve left some out…

So great. I’ll plant away and hope my home collected seed is goods. There was no shortage of it I have to say, if anyone wants some…

 

yes - particularly in the spot I’m thinking of. It is a bit sandy and will need water @pete

I’ve noticed how well so many plants respond to a bit of water. And how badly they do when I miss it or am irregular. Funny that. Usual problem: takes maybe an hour and a half to do everything full soak in our garden with no irrigation. Putting some automatic watering into some of our pots last year was a revelation. So I’ll expand that this year and try to get some automatic water onto everything if I can. Let’s see.