Thanks dan & ken.. Ken, you said to take the largest 1/3 of the branches out as close to the ground as possible. I understand that that's the way to do it, but if I do that I'll still have a very untidy looking shrub with long branches hanging over the driveway...I'd much prefer a more compact shape, maybe 4-5 ft tall. Dan, you said that it would take several years for the pruned plant to grow back to its present size. But what will it look like at the end of this summer? Will it be scraggly and open, or will it look full, but not as tall? Carly

Ken - thanks for the link. I wish the GW search had a date filter. I searched before I cut the first time, and when I searched again last week, seemed to be getting only the same (old) results. Maybe Zooba and I should have a "stumps to green" contest. :-) Zooba's at least have a certain architectural quality mine lack. I'll see what mine look like come next spring and replace if I need to replace.

in livonia.. i learned to consider these short lived plants ... living and prospering only until mother nature took them away ... one bad winter.. relish it while you can ... in whatever form it is in.. and what they said as to pruning ... the only one that got as big as you described.. didnt come back the next spring ... who knows if it was me or winter.. that did it.. for all i know.. i pruned it down that fall prior. . lol ... ken

No need to look for buds as the plant back-buds profusely after being pruned back hard; and, since it blooms on new growth, no need to worry about a hard pruning depriving you of blooms for an entire growth cycle. Something I wrote about how plants age vs how animals age, and why cutting a plant back hard rejuvenates it: We tend to think of the age of plants in the same manner we think of age of age in humans or animals, chronologically. We, like plants, go through several life stages - embryonic, juvenile, adolescent (intermediate in plants), and mature, are human stages roughly mirrored in plants. Where we vary greatly is in the way our cells age. In animals, body cells all mature at approximately the same speed. Plants grow by consecutive divisions of cells at the growing points (meristems), so their various parts are different ages (the top of the plant, or the ends of branches and stems are younger than the basal (lowest part, just above roots) portions, chronologically, but there is another way of aging plants. The ontogenetic age of plants is related to how many times a cell has to divide to make that particular portion of tissue. Basically, the closer the tissue is to the roots the younger it is ontogenetically, even though chronologically, it is the oldest. Why is this important & how does it apply to rejuvenation? Dormant buds retain the ontogenetic age at which they were formed & retain the same vigor as well. When numerous stems/branches are pruned back hard, production of a hormone (auxin) that suppressed the growth of the dormant juvenile (and very vigorous) buds is greatly diminished. When he removed the source of the hormone (primarily the growing tips of the stems) the dearth of auxin causes another hormone (cytokinin - an antagonist to auxin) to become dominant, which activates the dormant buds nearer the roots which retained the vigorous growth characteristics of a juvenile plant, causing the plant to respond with what is actually vigorous juvenile growth. Those of you who are familiar with rejuvenation pruning of multi-stemmed shrubs in the landscape are familiar with the procedure, but might not have known the actual mechanism which drives the results. It's typical for plants that grow in the shape of a flame or a pyramid standing on its point to be sparsely foliated proximal to the widest part of the plant and almost fully foliated distal to the widest part of the plant for 2 reasons. A) Apical dominance dictates the plant will spend something like 2/3 of the sun's energy it trapped by way of photosynthesis on the top 1/3 of the plant. B) The widest part of the plant shades the branches and stems proximal to that point. Al