My own experience is that a pot left beneath an oak tree with larger shrubs directly above for several years did manage to grow and bloom. This was in almost complete shade. I would imagine that given a bit more sunlight that the plant would have attained much more growth and blooms. I have since moved the plant to a sunny location so will see what happens this year. Sheila

I agree with Suzy about pruning back to 12"!! I have found that this plant LOVES it!! Last winter my arbour fell down and the thing was on the ground all winter. My Clematis looked dead & I cut it all the way down to the ground, but didn't disturb the roots. Finally, one little green stem popped up and now my arbour is densely covered and setting buds. I don't know if the location has anything to do with it(the arbour is located on the NW corner of my home), but it gets almost no sun and seems to thrive there. Good luck with yours!!

Well, I've spent a fair amount of time fighting honesuckle and multiflora rose to keep it out of the woods on properties I've worked at. Didn't realize until I Googled it that the native wild clematis, VB and Sweet Autumn Clematis were different, and that the non native one was invasive. It's the smelly one I want. The wild clematis is not showy enough to waste space on it in my tiny, tiny, tiny urban downtown row house yard. I don't feel there's much danger of my stuff invading a pristine natural area, the best luck a seed from my yard would have is to land on some vacant urban corner. I haven't read anything about the clematis being a big problem around here, but maybe that's because it is not very commonly grown or sold in nurseries. I don't mind cutting back the upper foliage, to keep it trained along the fence. My neighbors have a grape vine trellis that they have to keep after, but the roots don't wander, just the tops. But after that rose experience, I just don't want something with root suckers, because then I have to go into my neighbors yard to pull the stuff up, and it risks disrupting things, in my yard and hers. I don't want to accidentally uproot her tomatoes or something like that. Maybe I should go with a regular clematis. I sure do LOVE, LOVE the smell of the Sweet Autumn Clematis, and the flowers are pretty too. It smells like baby powder. I have such a tiny yard, I can never decide what to plant, because I am torn between wanting stuff to eat, smell and look pretty. I had to tear out my beloved crab apple which has all three qualities, because it was overrun with rust. I didn't treat it at first because the Cooperative Extension folks said it was just "cosmetic." But eventually the whole thing became infected and distorted and covered with the stuff. And I realized that the soil where all the leaves fell would now be infected for years to come. I finally put the poor thing out of its misery. Now there's a huge hole in my garden and I can't decide what to put there. So far I am replacing the tree with a red ninebark, but I don't know about along the fence behind it and on either side.

Here in NW Missouri, this vine grows up through trees, so yes - it should do fine in mostly shade.