Cutting back very overgrown climbing hydrangea

I have a very large overgrown climbing hydrangea. It's planted against a fence and is about five feet thick. It looks beautiful but has completely overgrown the border beneath.

I'm thinking of cutting it back hard to take it back to being a normal climber width (about 1 foot?) and thinking now as it's gone / going into dormancy would be a good time.

Wondering if anyone has any experience of reducing one in this way and if there is anything I should be aware of before doing it.

Thanks in advance for any replies.

 

Hello, welcome to GC! I did something like that in a client's garden with a Hydrangea petiolaris that had grown way too big. It survived, didn't flower much the following year but normal service was resumed after that.
The only thing that you need to watch out for are birds' nests, although they're unlikely to be breeding now, and wasps nests. If you've had any frost already, wasps shouldn't be a problem but I'd wear gloves just in case there's a sleepy queen lurking!

 

Yes, it'll be fine if you cut it back this year @LaurelLeaves , but you'll have to wait until it's settled in again, so don't expect flowers next year as they flower on the growth made the previous year. It's an ongoing maintenance programme with them, so they're best trimmed after flowering so that they have enough new growth hardened off for the following autumn/winter.

The only other thing I'd add is that fences aren't always great for them. They want to be very large climbers, and fences don't always offer a good support long term as the plants can be extremely heavy.

 

Brilliant, I really appreciate you sharing your reassuring experience

It actually looks really beautiful as it's grown more of a low tree like structure extending away from the fence in a dense canopy. But it's blocking the border beneath from any interesting planting.

Thanks for the comment about the fence, I had wondered about this. Will cut it back as a starting point and take it from there.

Many thanks.

 

The other option is to remove some of the long growth but keep some and train it. We have an enormous specimen on the front of our house and it goes wild where it doesn't matter but where we need to get passed, or want more control, we have trained it so that it stays flat. It's easy to do by simply tieing it in. It's hard with a fence rather than a really strong support but if our house wasn't there it would still support itself with its woody trunk.
I guess what I'm saying is don't be to hasty to whack it all back, be a little more selective and you will get a framework that still flowers a little next year.