if you wish.. you can run it over with a truck.. and it wont care .... years ago .. dad cut a 12 footer.. planted 2 feet from the house .. well.. actually he made me cut it.. lol ... to within 3 inches of the ground ... and by the end of summer it was back to 3 to 5 feet.. if memory serves ... do whatever you want.. whenever you want.. with this invasive weed ... in fact.. get rid of it.. and plant something better ... link .. otherwise.. knock yoruself out and dont worry about it. .. i think you are thinking about flowering shrubs.. which you usually do not prune until after flower... and this shrub is not known for it flowers.. so go at it ... [though of course it must flower.. to produce the invasive seeds] good luck .. ken in adrian mi ... Here is a link that might be useful: link

bboy, So burning bush can be cut down that low? I knew that abelia x grandiflora could be rejuvenated this way but didn't know burning bush could as well. Our small townhome community has some abelia and Bbush "hedges" which are currently being sheared by our landscaping company. I am trying to transition to a more natural look and thought with the abelia that we'd just cut those down to the ground next year in late Winter just before new growth starts. If the same can be done with BBush that would make things easy! How much growth would occur over the subsequent season? Could this be done every year??

Yes, it should be fine. I have the native wild version, Euonymous atropurpurea, the so-called "Wahoo Tree", and I wouldn't be afraid to prune it now. I actually cut mine down to stubs every 8-10 years, otherwise it gets full of old, dead and weak growth and seems to lose vigor.

I have a couple of those as well that I haven't pruned at all for 5 or 6 years. They slowly grow, at least on the north side of a building with a lot of competition from other bushes and trees. I don't think I've ever seen one that grew quickly, but I wouldn't know. I sorta doubt they are ever going to grow quickly in this dry climate. Re pruning, I would prune it if you want to shape it into something more manageable, and do it any time you feel like. The bush is generally grown for its fall color, not flowers (which I've never even noticed). Now that I think of it, we have two burning bushes because the small one, and its still pretty small, was given to us as a gift from a very good friend neighbor, and we planted it in a prominent position along the north side of the garage so they would see it when they drove in, and then it 'died', so my wife went and bought another, much bigger and ridiculously expensive one to replace it. Which then meant that the small one recovered. There they are, side by side.